Validation of two techniques for intraoperative hyperspectral human tissue determination

Purpose: Hyperspectral imaging (HSI) is a non-contact optical imaging technique with the potential to serve as an intraoperative computer-aided diagnostic tool. Our work analyzes the optical properties of visible structures in the surgical field for automatic tissue categorization. Approach: Building an HSI-based computer-aided tissue analysis system requires accurate ground truth and validation of optical soft tissue properties as these show large variability. We introduce and validate two different hyperspectral intraoperative imaging setups and their use for the analysis of optical tissue properties. First, we present an improved multispectral filter-wheel setup integrated into a fully digital microscope. Second, we present a novel setup of two hyperspectral snapshot cameras for intraoperative usage. Both setups are operating in the spectral range of 400 up to 975 nm. They are calibrated and validated using the same database and calibration set. Results: For validation, a color chart with 18 well-defined color spectra in the visual range is analyzed. Thus the results acquired with both settings become transferable and comparable to each other as well as between different interventions. On patient data of two different otorhinolaryngology procedures, we analyze the optical behaviors of different soft tissues and show a visualization of such different spectral information. Conclusion: The introduced calibration pipeline for different HSI setups allows comparison between all acquired spectral information. Clinical in vivo data underline the potential of HSI as an intraoperative diagnostic tool and the clinical usability of both introduced setups. Thereby, we demonstrate their feasibility for the in vivo analysis and categorization of different human soft tissues.