Informatics in Radiology (infoRAD): New tools for Computer Assistance in Thoracic CT. Part 1. Functional analysis of lungs, lung lobes, and bronchopulmonary segments

Owing to the rapid development of scanner technology, thoracic computed tomography (CT) offers new possibilities but also faces enormous challenges with respect to the quality of computer-assisted diagnosis and therapy planning. In the framework of the Virtual Institute for Computer Assistance in Clinical Radiology cooperative research project, a prototypical software application was developed to assist the radiologist in functional analysis of thoracic CT data. By identifying the anatomic compartments of the lungs, the software application enables assessment of established functional CT parameters for each individual lung, pulmonary lobe, and pulmonary segment. Such region-based assessment allows a more localized diagnosis of lung diseases such as emphysema and more accurate estimation of regional lung function from CT data. With close cooperation between computer scientists and radiologists, the software application was tested and optimized to achieve a high degree of usability. Several clinical studies...