Computer methods in quantitation of cardiac wall parameters from two dimensional echocardiograms: a survey

With increasing use of two-dimensional echocardiograms (2DE) for diagnosis [1, 2], efforts to computerize the process of quantification of cardiac parameters have increased. Visual processing of echocardiograms is time and labor intensive, and usually provides qualitative results with subjective variations [3]. In contrast, computer assisted methods are efficient and provide quantitative reproducible results. On the basis of the extent of computer usage, the 2DE processing methods are classified into three categories, namely, manual [9-30], interactive [32-49], and automatic methods [51-82]. This work is a structured survey of the published research on these three categories.