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Glioblastoma Segmentation: Comparison of Three Different Software Packages
Even Hovig Fyllingen1, Anne Line Stensjøen2, Erik Magnus Berntsen2,3
1Department of Neurosurgery, St. Olav's University Hospital, Trondheim, Norway.
Plos One
|October 26, 2016
Summary
Three brain tumor segmentation software packages showed high agreement for glioblastoma. While BrainVoyager was slower, ITK-Snap and 3D Slicer offered faster segmentation, though all were time-consuming for clinical use.
Area of Science:
- Neuroimaging
- Medical Software
- Oncology
Background:
- Widespread clinical use of volumetric tumor segmentation requires reliable and user-friendly software.
- Glioblastoma segmentation accuracy is critical for treatment planning and monitoring.
Purpose of the Study:
- To compare the performance of three semi-automatic brain tumor segmentation software packages: BrainVoyager QX, ITK-Snap, and 3D Slicer.
- To assess intra-rater, inter-rater, and between-software agreement for glioblastoma segmentation.
- To evaluate the time expenditure associated with each software package.
Main Methods:
- Contrast-enhanced T1-weighted MRI scans from 20 glioblastoma patients were segmented twice by two investigators in each software.
- Agreement was assessed using differences of means with 95% limits of agreement (LoA), Dice's similarity coefficients (DSC), and Hausdorff distance (HD).
- Segmentation time was recorded using a stopwatch.
Main Results:
- High agreement was observed within and between software packages, with Dice's similarity coefficients (DSC) ≥ 0.93 across all analyses.
- Inter-rater agreement was highest for BrainVoyager (mean difference 0.19 mL, 95% LoA -2.42 to 2.81 mL).
- Time expenditure was approximately 41 min for BrainVoyager and 18 min for ITK-Snap and 3D Slicer per segmentation.
Conclusions:
- All three software packages demonstrate high reliability and consistency for glioblastoma segmentation.
- ITK-Snap and 3D Slicer offer faster segmentation times compared to BrainVoyager.
- The time required for segmentation with all tested software may limit their routine clinical application.
