title: A technique for the computation of lower leg muscle volume from MRI images in the context of venous return.
abstract: A technique to automatically calculate the volume of a patient's calf muscle using MRI scans in the context of venous insufficiency is presented. Rather than giving a quantifiable measurement of volume, the technique provides a pixel count which can be used to compare the calf muscle volume of one leg of a patient against the other in the context of unilateral leg ulcers or to compare one patient's calf muscle volume against another patient. A custom MATLAB program reads the MRI scans (in the form of JPEG images) and determines the number of pixels (right and left limbs separately) that fall within a user defined gray-scale band, designated as being muscle. The output from the MATLAB program was compared with a manual counting method. The pixel counting algorithm was found to have an acceptable accuracy with results indicating a percentage difference from the manual method of between 2 and 9.5%.
authors.affiliation: Senior Member IEEE, Department of Electronic Engineering, National University of Ireland, Galway, Ireland.
authors.forename: Gearóid
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Olaighin
authors.forename: Barry J
authors.initials: BJ
authors.lastname: Broderick
authors.forename: Mary
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Clarke-Moloney
authors.forename: Fintan
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Wallis
authors.forename: Pierce A
authors.initials: PA
authors.lastname: Grace
mesh_terms: D001783:Blood Flow Velocity / Q000502:physiology*; D006801:Humans; D007090:Image Interpretation, Computer-Assisted / Q000379:methods*; D021621:Imaging, Three-Dimensional / Q000379:methods; D007866:Leg / Q000098:blood supply* / Q000502:physiology*; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging / Q000379:methods*; D018482:Muscle, Skeletal / Q000098:blood supply* / Q000502:physiology*; D009929:Organ Size / Q000502:physiology; D012039:Regional Blood Flow / Q000502:physiology; D014680:Veins / Q000502:physiology*