Interactive vessel-tracking with a hybrid model-based and graph-based approach
Dominik Fritz, Thomas Beck, Michael Scheuering · Proceedings of SPIE, the International Society for Optical Engineering/Proceedings of SPIE · 2009
For assessment of coronary artery disease (CAD) and peripheral artery disease (PAD) the automatic extraction of vessel centerlines is a crucial technology. In the most common approach two seed points have to be manually placed in the vessel and the centerline is automatically computed between these points. This methodology is appropriate for the quantitative analysis of single vessel segments. However, for an interactive and fast reading of complete datasets a more interactive approach would be beneficial. In this work we introduce an interactive vessel-tracking approach which eases the reading of cardiac and vascular CTA datasets. Starting with a single seed point a local vessel-tracking is initialized and extended in both directions while the user "walks" along the vessel centerline. For a robust tracking of a wide variety of vessel diameters, from coronaries to the aorta, we combine a local A*-graph-search for tiny vessels and a model-based tracking for larger vessels to an hybrid model-based and graph-based approach. In order to further ease the reading of cardiac and vascular CTA datasets, we introduce a subdivision of the interactively acquired centerline into segments that can be approximated by a single plane. This subdivision allows the visualization of the vessel in optimally oriented multi-planar reformations (MPR). The proposed visualization combines the advantage of a curved planar reformation (CPR), showing a large part of the vessel in one view, with the benefits of a MPR, having a non distorted more trustable image.