An Automatic Detection Method for Spinal Deformity from Moire Topographic Images Employing Asymmetric Degree of Shoulder and Waistlines

Abstract

Spinal deformity is one of a serious disease mainly suffered by teenagers during their growth stage. To detect the spinal deformity in early stage, orthopedists have performed a painless examination which called a forward bending test or moire topographic image test in mass screening. It is, however, inspection base on the forward bending method takes much time and the moire images and visual examination also require a large amount of moire images because from elementary as well as junior high schools are collected. This causes exhaustion of orthopedists and therefore leads to misjudgment. Therefore realization of automated scoliosis inspection based on the moire images has long been desired among orthopedists. In this paper, we propose a method for automatic detection of spinal deformity from moire topographic images by using a new asymmetric feature which is obtained difference of left- and right-hand side shoulder and waistlines. The proposed technique applied 1200 real moire topographic images. Obtained some experimental results are shown along with a discussion.