An analysis algorithm for accurate determination of articular cartilage thickness of hip joint from MR images

To test the accuracy of the most widely used technique based on edge detection for thickness measurement of the hip joint cartilage in MR images, and to improve the measurement accuracy by developing a new measurement method based on a model of the MRI process.

MRI was performed in 3 normal cadaver hips, 25 hips of normal volunteers, and 25 hips of patients with osteoarthritis. In general, thickness was defined as the distance between the two sides of the hip cartilage along the normal directions of the cartilage surfaces. In this article this is referred to as the "edge detection method." A theoretical simulation analysis revealed that the edge detection method considerably underestimated the cartilage thickness of the hip joint. A new measurement method based on a model of the MR imaging process was accordingly proposed for correcting the measurement errors.

In the experiment using the cadaver hips, anatomical measurement of cartilage thickness was used as reference standard. For measurements at 35 sites, the proposed model-based method gave results similar to those presented from anatomic section, while the edge detection method gave underestimation compared with the anatomic thickness. The underestimation biases for the edge detection method were consistent with the biases predicted by theoretical simulation. In the experiment using the hips of volunteers and patients, the edge detection result was an underestimation compared with the result generated by using the model-based method.

The edge detection method underestimated the hip cartilage thickness in MR images. The proposed model-based method was more accurate than the edge detection method for thickness measurement of the hip cartilage.