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Automatic bone age assessment for young children from newborn to 7-year-old using carpal bones

Aifeng Zhang1, Arkadiusz Gertych, Brent J Liu

  • 1Image Processing & Informatics Lab, Department of Radiology, University of Southern California, Marina Del Rey, CA 90292, USA. azhang@usc.edu

Computerized Medical Imaging and Graphics : the Official Journal of the Computerized Medical Imaging Society
|March 21, 2007
PubMed

Insights

This study introduces a new computer-aided diagnosis (CAD) method for assessing bone age in young children. By analyzing carpal bones, this approach accurately determines bone age from newborn to 7 years old.

Area of Science:

  • Medical Imaging
  • Artificial Intelligence in Medicine
  • Pediatric Radiology

Background:

  • Existing computer-aided diagnosis (CAD) methods for bone age assessment are limited to children aged 7-18.
  • Assessing bone age in younger children (newborn to 7 years) requires incorporating carpal bone analysis.
  • Automatic segmentation of carpal bones is challenging due to variable appearance, soft tissue, and low contrast.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To develop and implement a knowledge-based method for fully automatic carpal bone segmentation and morphological feature analysis.
  • To utilize fuzzy classification for bone age assessment based on carpal bone features.
  • To evaluate the reliability of carpal regions of interest (ROI) for bone age determination in young children.

Main Methods:

  • A knowledge-based method was developed for automatic carpal bone segmentation.
  • Morphological features were extracted from segmented carpal bones.
  • Fuzzy classification was employed to assess bone age using these features.

Main Results:

  • The developed method successfully segmented carpal bones in cases without overlap.
  • Computer-aided diagnosis (CAD) results for bone age assessment were evaluated against chronological age and radiologist readings.
  • The carpal ROI proved to be a reliable source of information for determining bone age in children from newborn to 7 years old.

Conclusions:

  • A novel, knowledge-based CAD method enables automatic carpal bone segmentation and analysis for bone age assessment.
  • This approach extends bone age assessment to younger children (newborn to 7 years) by effectively utilizing carpal bone information.
  • The findings highlight the significance of carpal bones in pediatric bone age determination.

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