Compression of mammograms for medical practice

ABSTRACT

This paper considers effective compression methods for mammogram storing and interchange. A controversy problem of irreversible compression of medical images is studied in clinical tests to check usefulness and possibility of acceptance of wavelet-based compression for clinical applications. Diagnostic accuracy is measured in abnormality detection tests with ROC-based analysis, and by subjective rating of diagnostically important image features affecting lesion symptoms and image ordering according to preserved diagnostic accuracy. The efficiency of the most approved lossless coders is compared to efficiency of irreversible wavelet coding in acceptable rate range. General conclusion is that more effective irreversible compression of mammograms up to 1bpp is safe (i.e. preserves diagnostic accuracy), according to opinions of radiologists participating the experiments and presented results.

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INDEX TERMS

Primary Classification:
  I. Computing Methodologies
  I.4 IMAGE PROCESSING AND COMPUTER VISION
      I.4.2 Compression (Coding)

General Terms:
Experimentation, Human Factors, Reliability, Verification

Keywords:
diagnostic accuracy evaluation, image compression