The Measurement Of Relative Blood Flow: An Example Of Centralized Radiological Image Processing

The ability to perform post-processing on diagnostic images is becomming more and more important especially as an effort to extract additional information to aid diagnosis. However, it is often the case that researchers need to implement their own image analysis which is beyond the ability of manufacturer-supplied software. This analysis can be done by either directly programming the clinical device or performing the analysis on a centralized image processing system. This paper presents an example where advanced image analysis was performed on a centralized system. Digital fluorographic (DF) blood flow analysis was done after DF images were transferred from the Angiographic Laboratory to the Image Processing Laboratory. The advantages and disadvantages of the use of such a centralized processing scheme are discussed in the light of the DF example.