Liver Volumetry in MRI by Using Fast Marching Algorithm Coupled with 3D Geodesic Active Contour Segmentation

In this chapter, we present an accurate automated 3D liver segmentation scheme for measuring liver volumes in MR images. Our scheme consisted of five steps. First, an anisotropic diffusion smoothing filter was applied to T1-weighted MR images of the liver in the portal-venous phase to reduce noise while preserving the liver boundaries. An edge enhancer and a nonlinear gray-scale converter were applied to enhance the liver boundary. This boundary-enhanced image was used as a speed function for a 3D fast marching algorithm to generate an initial surface that roughly approximated the liver shape. A 3D geodesic active contour segmentation algorithm refined the initial surface so as to more precisely determine the liver boundary. The liver volume was calculated based on the refined liver surface. The MR liver volumetry based on our automated scheme agreed excellently with “gold-standard” manual volumetry (intra-class correlation coefficient was 0.98) and required substantially less completion time (our processing time of 1 vs. 24 min/case in manual segmentation).

[1]  Leo Joskowicz,et al.  An iterative Bayesian approach for nearly automatic liver segmentation: algorithm and validation , 2008, International Journal of Computer Assisted Radiology and Surgery.

[2]  N. Yamanaka,et al.  Prediction of the safe limits of hepatectomy by combined volumetric and functional measurements in patients with impaired hepatic function. , 1994, Cancer treatment and research.

[3]  Kevin J Chang,et al.  Liver and spleen volumetry with quantitative MR imaging and dual-space clustering segmentation. , 2005, Radiology.

[4]  Yen-Wei Chen,et al.  Automated segmentation of the liver from 3D CT images using probabilistic atlas and multilevel statistical shape model. , 2008, Academic radiology.

[5]  Nikos Paragios,et al.  Liver Segmentation Using Sparse 3D Prior Models with Optimal Data Support , 2007, IPMI.

[6]  P. Terasaki,et al.  Liver transplantation in the United States. , 2005, Clinical transplants.

[7]  J. Fleiss,et al.  Intraclass correlations: uses in assessing rater reliability. , 1979, Psychological bulletin.

[8]  D. Altman,et al.  STATISTICAL METHODS FOR ASSESSING AGREEMENT BETWEEN TWO METHODS OF CLINICAL MEASUREMENT , 1986, The Lancet.

[9]  S. Walter,et al.  Sample size and optimal designs for reliability studies. , 1998, Statistics in medicine.

[10]  J J Fung,et al.  Liver Transplantation in the United States, 1999–2008 , 2010, American journal of transplantation : official journal of the American Society of Transplantation and the American Society of Transplant Surgeons.

[11]  J A Sethian,et al.  A fast marching level set method for monotonically advancing fronts. , 1996, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America.

[12]  Jitendra Malik,et al.  Scale-Space and Edge Detection Using Anisotropic Diffusion , 1990, IEEE Trans. Pattern Anal. Mach. Intell..

[13]  A. Beckett,et al.  AKUFO AND IBARAPA. , 1965, Lancet.

[14]  C E Broelsch,et al.  Preoperative Volume Prediction in Adult Living Donor Liver Transplantation: How Much Can We Rely on It? , 2007, American journal of transplantation : official journal of the American Society of Transplantation and the American Society of Transplant Surgeons.

[15]  James A. Sethian,et al.  Level Set Methods and Fast Marching Methods , 1999 .

[16]  Kunio Doi,et al.  Automated hepatic volumetry for living related liver transplantation at multisection CT. , 2006, Radiology.

[17]  S. Fan,et al.  Adult-to-adult living donor liver transplantation using extended right lobe grafts. , 1997, Annals of surgery.

[18]  László Ruskó,et al.  Liver segmentation for contrast-enhanced MR images using partitioned probabilistic model , 2010, International Journal of Computer Assisted Radiology and Surgery.

[19]  Diethard Monbaliu,et al.  Liver transplantation using Donation after Cardiac Death donors. , 2012, Journal of hepatology.

[20]  B. Dawant,et al.  Liver segmentation in living liver transplant donors: comparison of semiautomatic and manual methods. , 2005, Radiology.

[21]  Henry Völzke,et al.  A fully automatic three-step liver segmentation method on LDA-based probability maps for multiple contrast MR images. , 2010, Magnetic resonance imaging.

[22]  Jianwu Xu,et al.  Computer-aided measurement of liver volumes in CT by means of geodesic active contour segmentation coupled with level-set algorithms. , 2010, Medical physics.

[23]  Guillermo Sapiro,et al.  Geodesic Active Contours , 1995, International Journal of Computer Vision.

[24]  S. Goldberg,et al.  Accuracy of volumetric measurements after virtual right hepatectomy in potential donors undergoing living adult liver transplantation. , 2001, AJR. American journal of roentgenology.

[25]  Aytekin Oto,et al.  Quantitative radiology: automated CT liver volumetry compared with interactive volumetry and manual volumetry. , 2011, AJR. American journal of roentgenology.

[26]  S. Biggins.  Futility and rationing in liver retransplantation: when and how can we say no? , 2012, Journal of hepatology.

[27]  E. Fishman,et al.  Automatic liver segmentation technique for three-dimensional visualization of CT data. , 1996, Radiology.

[28]  K. Sandrasegaran,et al.  Measurement of liver volume using spiral CT and the curved line and cubic spline algorithms: reproducibility and interobserver variation , 1999, Abdominal Imaging.

[29]  L. Portney,et al.  Foundations of Clinical Research: Applications to Practice , 2015 .

[30]  M. Giger,et al.  Automatic segmentation of liver structure in CT images. , 1993, Medical physics.

[31]  Ulas Bagci,et al.  3D automatic anatomy segmentation based on iterative graph-cut-ASM. , 2011, Medical physics.

[32]  J. Fujimoto,et al.  Impact of Preoperative Planning Using Virtual Segmental Volumetry on Liver Resection for Hepatocellular Carcinoma , 2007, World Journal of Surgery.

[33]  P Stolzmann,et al.  CT- and MRI-based volumetry of resected liver specimen: comparison to intraoperative volume and weight measurements and calculation of conversion factors. , 2010, European journal of radiology.

[34]  Cüneyt Güzelis,et al.  Patient oriented and robust automatic liver segmentation for pre-evaluation of liver transplantation , 2008, Comput. Biol. Medicine.