
AbstractIn this study, we have proposed and validated that histogram of a good-quality bone scan image can enhance a poor-quality bone scan image. The histograms of two good-quality technetium-99m methyl diphosphonate bone scan images IAand IBrecommended by nuclear medicine physicians (NMPs) were used to enhance 87 poor-quality bone scan images. Processed images and their corresponding input images were compared visually by two NMPs with scoring and also quantitatively using entropy, Structural similarity index measure, edge-based contrast measure, and absolute brightness mean error. Barnard's unconditional test was applied with a null hypothesis that the histogram of both IAand IBproduces similar output image at α =0.05. The mean values of quantitative metrices of the processed images obtained using IAand IBwere compared using Kolmogorov—Smirnov test. Histogram of a good-quality bone scan image can enhance a poor-quality bone scan image. Visually, histogram of IBimproved statistically significantly higher proportion (P < 0.0001) of images (86/87) as compared to histogram of IA(51/87). Quantitatively, IBperformed better than IA,and the Chi-square distance of input and IBwas smaller than that of IA. In addition, a statistically significant (P < 0.05) difference in all the quantitative metrics among the outputs obtained using IAand IBwas observed. In our study, reference histogram of good-quality bone scan images transformed the majority of poor-quality bone scan images (98.85%) into visually good-quality images acceptable by NMPs.
Medical physics. Medical radiology. Nuclear medicine, histogram specification, technetium 99m methyl diphosphonate bone scan, R895-920, Original Article, image enhancement
Medical physics. Medical radiology. Nuclear medicine, histogram specification, technetium 99m methyl diphosphonate bone scan, R895-920, Original Article, image enhancement
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