RU2226071C2 - Method for applying colorimetric techniques of mucous membrane in performing video endoscopic examinations - Google Patents

Abstract

FIELD: medicine. SUBSTANCE: method involves processing image by means of computer having image-capturing chip and color recognition software. Color space coordinates are measured on RGB-vectors and color quantity index C is calculated. C being less than 50, mucous membrane color is interpreted as marked hyperemia. The value being from 51 to 55, moderate hyperemia is considered to be the case. The value being from 56 to 60, mild hyperemia is considered to be the case. The value being from61 to 65, mucous membrane color is determined as pink, 66 to 69 is determined as pale pink, 70 to 55 being interpreted as light gray, greater than 75 being interpreted as gray. Image processing is carried out in real-time endoscopic examination mode or in retrospective mode from video records. EFFECT: high accuracy of measurements. 3 cl, 11 dwg, 4 tbl

Description

The invention relates to medicine, namely endoscopy, and can be used for endoscopic diagnosis.

Work in endoscopy is directly related to the interpretation of the visible image. The methodology of endoscopic examination itself depends on subjective perception, depending on the qualifications of the doctor, experience, as well as color perception. An important part of endoscopy is mucosal assessment.

Known evaluation criteria are to describe the color of the mucosa, the nature of its surface, the presence of pathological changes on it. The description of the color of the mucosa occurs at the level of separation into weak, moderate and bright hyperemia, pink color, pale pink, grayish, gray color; focal or diffuse changes. The assessment of this indicator is visual and subjective. (Saveliev B.C. Guide to Clinical Endoscopy. –M.: Medicine, 1985, p.23, ch. 1.2.6 - ″ visual studies ″).

Each endoscopic examination involves colorimetry when determining the color of the mucous membrane of the organ under study. Such colorimetry is called the color perception of the doctor, which can be represented as follows. The mucous membrane — the endoscope — the eye as an organ of vision (in the retina of a cone of three types R, G, B) —the visual tubercle (primary visual center — corpus genculatlum laterale radiatio optica or Gracioli bunch) —Sulcii calcarini of the occipital lobe, as the cortical analyzer of vision (FIG. .4).

A person's color perception is able to distinguish 150 colors by color tone, about 25 by saturation, and from 20 to 64 by lightness. With anomalies in color vision (color perception), fewer colors are distinguished. Statistically, 10% of people are partially or completely "color blind", of which 95% are men. Important is the dependence of a person's color perception on the psychophysiological state (decrease with fatigue, etc.)

Thus, color perception (colorimetry) of a person (doctor) is subjective, based on the normal physiology of vision.

In most cases, endoscopy requires only the endoscope itself (gastroscope, bronchoscope, colonoscope, etc.) and a illuminator (light source).

The prototype is a method for determining the color of the mucosa, which uses complexes based on a video camera and a monitor — video endoscopy (Savelyev V.S. Guidelines for clinical endoscopy. - M .: Medicine, 1985, p.12). However, this method does not exclude the color perception of the doctor as the main method for determining color (Fig. 5 a).

The proposed method solves the problem of endoscopic colorimetry (color metrology) of the mucous membranes, in which objective, unambiguous color characteristics are obtained.

Technical result achieved by the invention: improving the accuracy of color determination due to its quantitative assessment, the ability to compare the amount of color of the mucous membrane during dynamic control studies.

The specified technical result is achieved by processing the image with a colorimetric complex.

Figure 1 shows the CIE RGB colorimetric system, figure 2 - CIE XYZ colorimetric system, figure 3 is an XY color chart, figure 4 is a diagram of a traditional endoscopy, figure 5 is a general diagram of a video endoscopic complex: a - traditional, b - proposed, in Fig.6 - the program interface "color metrology", Fig.7 - algorithm for computer colorimetric processing of the video image, Fig.8 - endophoto of the patient Zaderey, Fig.9 - endophoto of the patient Alexandrova, Fig. 10 - endophoto of the patient Zainutdinov, 11 - repeated endophoto of the patient ynutdinova.

Methods for determining the amount of color - colorimetry or metrology of color are used in physics, astronomy, publishing, printing, film, video and Internet products. (Shashlov A., Churkin A. Computerra, No. 16, 1999.)

Known methods for determining color by RGB, XYZ, CMYK, HSL, HSB. The CMYK system (cyan, magenta, yellow) is used in printing for the correct transfer of colors with paints on paper, etc. The HSB (hue, saturation, brightness) system is based on determining the hue of saturation and brightness. HSL (hue, saturation, luminosity) system for determining hue, saturation and illumination (www.colormatter.com).

To solve the problem of determining the amount of color of the mucous membranes, a method for determining color using the CIE XYZ system was used. To understand the XYZ system, consider the RGB system. The RGB system was founded in 1931 at a CIE session. The definition of color is based on the determination of the spatial coordinate in the three-dimensional space of the vectors Red, Green, Blue (figure 1).

At the ICE session in the same 1931, another system was adopted. Its constituent colors were more saturated than spectral. Since there are no such flowers in nature, it is called XYZ. This colorimetric system was obtained artificially by recalculation from the color coordinates of RGB (Fig.2).

The choice of XYZ colors stemmed from the tasks set in the development of this system. The main ones were the simplification of the calculations and the absence of negative coordinates, which is inevitable if RGB colors are taken as the main ones.

Currently, the XYZ international colorimetric system is working. It usually expresses the results of measurements, and the RGB system performs an auxiliary, sometimes control, function. Nevertheless, it should be noted once again that the RGB system was the basis of the XYZ system.

Color distribution R G B from 0 (no color) to 255 (maximum intensity), therefore, the maximum color display is 256x256x256 = 16.7 + millions of different colors that the CIE XYZ specification can display. (www.rgb.com)

Thus, any shade of color has its own easily calculated spatial coordinates (Shashlov A., Churkin A. Color space. Computerra, 16, 1999).

One of the basic provisions of the standard XYZ colorimetric system is as follows: the chromaticity coordinates of all real colors of the rgb system must lie inside the xyz chromaticity triangle. The white point on the xy diagram should have the coordinates 0.33; 0.33 (as in the rg diagram), which corresponds to the equal-energy source E. Given that the XYZ colorimetric system was obtained by recalculation from RGB, this position of the white point was achieved. The addition curves rl, gl, bl were also converted to xl, yl, zl (Fig. 3).

The authors in the medical-scientific and patent literature did not find information about the colorimetric processing of the image of the mucous membranes. Thus, the present invention meets the criterion of ″ world novelty ″.

With the famous colorimetry of color, the authors first studied and proved in practice a quantitative characterization of possible mucosal staining options. The above quantitative characteristics are new and do not explicitly follow from the prior art. Thus, the invention meets the criterion of ″ inventive step ″.

A method for determining the color of mucous membranes during endoscopic examinations consists in a complex technique, including traditional video endoscopy and image processing with a colorimetric complex (Fig.5b).

The colorimetric complex consists of hardware and software.

The hardware is the addition of a video endoscopic complex with a computer with a video capture card.

Software part - a program that imports a mucosal image captured by a video card and measures the amount of color according to the CIE XYZ system in a selected area of the mucous membrane.

The colorimetric program interface consists of two modules - a patient registration module and a color amount determination module (Fig. 6).

An IBM PC type computer is used with a video capture card ″ Asustek 6600DLX ″, which allows receiving a video signal (TV-in). The video image is captured by ″ AsusLive! ″ In two continuous display (or recording) modes and as 24-bit color depth slides. To measure color, the developed program ″ Color Metrology ″ is used, which imports the selected slides of the mucous membrane of the organ under investigation (Fig. 7).

The ″ Color Metrology ″ program is based on the mathematical model of the CIE XYZ colorimetric system.

The program ″ Color Metrology ″ allows you to arbitrarily make color measurements on a selected area (segment) of the slide. The spatial coordinates of the color are determined by the vectors Red- ″ red ″, Green- “green”, Blue- ″ blue ″ from 0 to 255 in the XY coordinate axis and the indicator is the amount of color (the result of the sum of color equations defined on a given area) (A. Shashlov , A. Churkin. Metrology of color, Computerra, No. 16, 1999).

Description of the research methodology for the example of determining the amount of color of the gastric mucosa.

A fibrogastroscope with the head of the camera (video gastroscopy) is introduced into the esophagus, stomach and examine the sections of the stomach according to the method of traditional gastroscopy. (Saveliev V.S. Guide to clinical endoscopy, 1985). The image of the gastric mucosa by an endoscopic video camera is transmitted to a computer, the video image of the gastric mucosa is captured, in real time, 24-bit slides of the measured gastric mucosa are produced, which are imported into the colorimetric program, which real-time determines the amount of color in the selected mucosa the membrane of the stomach. Colorimetric measurement data is stored in the ″ Color Metrology ″ program individually for each patient with the possibility of retrospective analysis of stored mucous membrane slides with the results of color amount measurements.

The experience of applying the technique in gastroscopy showed the following results:

The color index of the mucous membrane with values less than 50 corresponds to vivid hyperemia, from 51 to 55 moderate hyperemia, from 56 to 60 - slight hyperemia, from 61 to 65 - pink, from 66-69 - pale pink, from 70 to 75 - grayish color , more than 75 - gray color of the mucous membrane. The color units correspond to the standard CIE XYZ colorimetric system (Commision Inernationale de L’Eclairage - International Lighting Commission).

Example 1. Patient Zaderey, 24 years old. Endoscopic conclusion:

Superficial gastroduodenitis. (Fig. 8)

Example 2. Patient Aleksandrova, 36 years old. Endoscopic conclusion: Atrophic gastritis. (Fig.9)

Color metrology data.

It should be noted that with atrophic gastritis, the indicator C (color) is higher than with superficial. This is due to the fact that with atrophic gastritis, white color is more pronounced (high values of all the primary colors of red, blue, green), since the mucous membrane is subjectively grayish in color. With superficial gastritis, the subjectively mucous is brightly hyperemic (more of the red component with a decrease in green and blue).

In dynamic control studies, color metrology quantitatively shows the dynamics of mucosal color changes.

Example 3. Patient Zainutdinov, 65 years old. Endoscopic conclusion: Reflux gastritis of the operated stomach according to Billroth-1. Superficial anastomositis. (figure 10).

Color metrology data from the initial study.

Color metrology data obtained by re-examination after 7 days (11)

Colorimetric data show, with a seemingly similar endoscopic picture, different values of the amount of color in the mucosa. This color change is important in assessing the dynamics of reparative processes, the degree of effectiveness of drug treatment of gastritis, peptic ulcer, diseases of the operated stomach.

Reliably determined the color of the gastric mucosa, 12 p.k. in patients with chronic gastritis, gastric ulcer and 12 p.k. and operated stomachs. Control-dynamic colorimetry of the mucous membrane was carried out for patients after gastrectomy, patients with gastric ulcer and 12 p.c. The data obtained allowed us to determine the dynamics of changes in the color of the mucous membrane in this group of patients objectively - quantitatively.

Compared with the visual method for assessing the color of the mucous membrane by the color perception of the doctor, the proposed method for determining the color of the mucous membranes has the following advantages:

1. The subjectivity of the description of the color of the mucous membrane by the doctor due to the determination of color by the CIE XYZ colorimetric system is excluded.

2. The data obtained are objective and unambiguous (color according to the vectors R, G, B from 0-255; indicator color in the range <50-75>).

3. Determination of the quantitative dynamics of the color change of the mucous membrane during dynamic control studies.

It should be noted additional characteristics of this technique:

1. Ease of performing the technique - directly during the usual time of endoscopic examination.

2. Absolute non-injuries - the absence of probes, sensors, etc., laser radiation, ultrasonic waves, etc. etc.

3. The ability to determine color retrospectively by analyzing the image of the mucous membrane from video tapes, video-CD discs, etc.

The disadvantages of this technique:

1. The presence on the gastric mucosa of mucus, bile, distorting the measurements made.

2. The presence of glare from a light source on the mucous membrane.

To address these shortcomings, it is recommended:

1. Measure from unpolluted areas of the mucous membrane or after removal of contamination.

2. Using an endoscopic video camera with anti-glare system.

Separately, it should be noted the technical simplicity of this method and its implementation with conventional fibrogastroscopy. The method is easily reproducible and gives, when implemented, the indicated technical result. Thus, the present invention meets the criterion of ″ industrial applicability ″.

Claims (3)

1. The method of colorimetry of the mucous membranes during video endoscopic examinations by processing an image with a computer with a video capture card and color determination program, characterized in that the spatial coordinates of the color are measured by the vectors R, G, B and the indicator "color amount" (C), with values of C less than 50, the color of the mucous membrane is defined as bright hyperemia, from 51 to 55 - as moderate hyperemia, from 56 to 60 - as mild hyperemia, with values of C from 61 to 65, the color of the mucosa is defined as pink, from 66-69 - as pale pink first, 70 to 75 - as a grayish, and more than 75 for values - as gray. 2. The method according to claim 1, characterized in that the image processing is carried out in real time endoscopic examination. 3. The method according to claim 1, characterized in that the image processing is carried out retrospectively by video.

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