Estimation of prenatal aorta intima-media thickness in ultrasound examination

Elisa Veronese; Enea Poletti; Erich Cosmi; Enrico Grisan

doi:10.1117/12.911262

23 February 2012 Estimation of prenatal aorta intima-media thickness in ultrasound examination

Elisa Veronese, Enea Poletti, Erich Cosmi, Enrico Grisan

Proceedings Volume 8315, Medical Imaging 2012: Computer-Aided Diagnosis; 83150M (2012) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.911262
Event: SPIE Medical Imaging, 2012, San Diego, California, United States

Abstract

Prenatal events such as intrauterine growth restriction have been shown to be associated with an increased thickness of abdominal aorta in the fetus. Therefore the measurement of abdominal aortic intima-media thickness (aIMT) has been recently considered a sensitive marker of artherosclerosis risk. To date measure of aortic diameter and of aIMT has been performed manually on US fetal images, thus being susceptible to intra- and inter- operator variability. This work introduces an automatic algorithm that identifies abdominal aorta and estimates its diameter and aIMT from videos recorded during routine third trimester ultrasonographic fetal biometry. Firstly, in each frame, the algorithm locates and segments the region corresponding to aorta by means of an active contour driven by two different external forces: a static vector field convolution force and a dynamic pressure force. Then, in each frame, the mean diameter of the vessel is computed, to reconstruct the cardiac cycle: in fact, we expect the diameter to have a sinusoidal trend, according to the heart rate. From the obtained sinusoid, we identify the frames corresponding to the end diastole and to the end systole. Finally, in these frames we assess the aIMT. According to its definition, we consider as aIMT the distance between the leading edge of the blood-intima interface, and the leading edge of the media-adventitia interface on the far wall of the vessel. The correlation between end-diastole and end-systole aIMT automatic and manual measures is 0.90 and 0.84 respectively.

Citation Download Citation

Elisa Veronese, Enea Poletti, Erich Cosmi, and Enrico Grisan "Estimation of prenatal aorta intima-media thickness in ultrasound examination", Proc. SPIE 8315, Medical Imaging 2012: Computer-Aided Diagnosis, 83150M (23 February 2012); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.911262

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