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Carolina Malagelada, Michal Drozdzal, Santiago Segui, Sara Mendez, Jordi Vitria, Petia Radeva, et al. (2015). Classification of functional bowel disorders by objective physiological criteria based on endoluminal image analysis. AJPGI - American Journal of Physiology-Gastrointestinal and Liver Physiology, 309(6), G413–G419.
Abstract: We have previously developed an original method to evaluate small bowel motor function based on computer vision analysis of endoluminal images obtained by capsule endoscopy. Our aim was to demonstrate intestinal motor abnormalities in patients with functional bowel disorders by endoluminal vision analysis. Patients with functional bowel disorders (n = 205) and healthy subjects (n = 136) ingested the endoscopic capsule (Pillcam-SB2, Given-Imaging) after overnight fast and 45 min after gastric exit of the capsule a liquid meal (300 ml, 1 kcal/ml) was administered. Endoluminal image analysis was performed by computer vision and machine learning techniques to define the normal range and to identify clusters of abnormal function. After training the algorithm, we used 196 patients and 48 healthy subjects, completely naive, as test set. In the test set, 51 patients (26%) were detected outside the normal range (P < 0.001 vs. 3 healthy subjects) and clustered into hypo- and hyperdynamic subgroups compared with healthy subjects. Patients with hypodynamic behavior (n = 38) exhibited less luminal closure sequences (41 ± 2% of the recording time vs. 61 ± 2%; P < 0.001) and more static sequences (38 ± 3 vs. 20 ± 2%; P < 0.001); in contrast, patients with hyperdynamic behavior (n = 13) had an increased proportion of luminal closure sequences (73 ± 4 vs. 61 ± 2%; P = 0.029) and more high-motion sequences (3 ± 1 vs. 0.5 ± 0.1%; P < 0.001). Applying an original methodology, we have developed a novel classification of functional gut disorders based on objective, physiological criteria of small bowel function.
Keywords: capsule endoscopy; computer vision analysis; functional bowel disorders; intestinal motility; machine learning
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R.A.Bendezu, E.Barba, E.Burri, D.Cisternas, Carolina Malagelada, Santiago Segui, et al. (2015). Intestinal gas content and distribution in health and in patients with functional gut symptoms. NEUMOT - Neurogastroenterology & Motility, 27(9), 1249–1257.
Abstract: BACKGROUND:
The precise relation of intestinal gas to symptoms, particularly abdominal bloating and distension remains incompletely elucidated. Our aim was to define the normal values of intestinal gas volume and distribution and to identify abnormalities in relation to functional-type symptoms.
METHODS:
Abdominal computed tomography scans were evaluated in healthy subjects (n = 37) and in patients in three conditions: basal (when they were feeling well; n = 88), during an episode of abdominal distension (n = 82) and after a challenge diet (n = 24). Intestinal gas content and distribution were measured by an original analysis program. Identification of patients outside the normal range was performed by machine learning techniques (one-class classifier). Results are expressed as median (IQR) or mean ± SE, as appropriate.
KEY RESULTS:
In healthy subjects the gut contained 95 (71, 141) mL gas distributed along the entire lumen. No differences were detected between patients studied under asymptomatic basal conditions and healthy subjects. However, either during a spontaneous bloating episode or once challenged with a flatulogenic diet, luminal gas was found to be increased and/or abnormally distributed in about one-fourth of the patients. These patients detected outside the normal range by the classifier exhibited a significantly greater number of abnormal features than those within the normal range (3.7 ± 0.4 vs 0.4 ± 0.1; p < 0.001).
CONCLUSIONS & INFERENCES:
The analysis of a large cohort of subjects using original techniques provides unique and heretofore unavailable information on the volume and distribution of intestinal gas in normal conditions and in relation to functional gastrointestinal symptoms.
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G.Blasco, Simone Balocco, J.Puig, J.Sanchez-Gonzalez, W.Ricart, J.Daunis-I-Estadella, et al. (2015). Carotid pulse wave velocity by magnetic resonance imaging is increased in middle-aged subjects with the metabolic syndrome. ICJI - International Journal of Cardiovascular Imaging, 31(3), 603–612.
Abstract: Arterial pulse wave velocity (PWV), an independent predictor of cardiovascular disease, physiologically increases with age; however, growing evidence suggests metabolic syndrome (MetS) accelerates this increase. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) enables reliable noninvasive assessment of arterial stiffness by measuring arterial PWV in specific vascular segments. We investigated the association between the presence of MetS and its components with carotid PWV (cPWV) in asymptomatic subjects without diabetes. We assessed cPWV by MRI in 61 individuals (mean age, 55.3 ± 14.1 years; median age, 55 years): 30 with MetS and 31 controls with similar age, sex, body mass index, and LDL-cholesterol levels. The study population was dichotomized by the median age. To remove the physiological association between PWV and age, unpaired t tests and multiple regression analyses were performed using the residuals of the regression between PWV and age. cPWV was higher in middle-aged subjects with MetS than in those without (p = 0.001), but no differences were found in elder subjects (p = 0.313). cPWV was associated with diastolic blood pressure (r = 0.276, p = 0.033) and waist circumference (r = 0.268, p = 0.038). The presence of MetS was associated with increased cPWV regardless of age, sex, blood pressure, and waist (p = 0.007). The MetS components contributing independently to an increased cPWV were hypertension (p = 0.018) and hypertriglyceridemia (p = 0.002). The presence of MetS is associated with an increased cPWV in middle-aged subjects. In particular, hypertension and hypertriglyceridemia may contribute to early progression of carotid stiffness.
Keywords: Metabolic syndrome; Arterial stiffness; Pulse wave velocity; Carotid artery; Magnetic resonance
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Lluis Garrido, M.Guerrieri, & Laura Igual. (2015). Image Segmentation with Cage Active Contours. TIP - IEEE Transactions on Image Processing, 24(12), 5557–5566.
Abstract: In this paper, we present a framework for image segmentation based on parametrized active contours. The evolving contour is parametrized according to a reduced set of control points that form a closed polygon and have a clear visual interpretation. The parametrization, called mean value coordinates, stems from the techniques used in computer graphics to animate virtual models. Our framework allows to easily formulate region-based energies to segment an image. In particular, we present three different local region-based energy terms: 1) the mean model; 2) the Gaussian model; 3) and the histogram model. We show the behavior of our method on synthetic and real images and compare the performance with state-of-the-art level set methods.
Keywords: Level sets; Mean value coordinates; Parametrized active contours; level sets; mean value coordinates
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C. Butakoff, Simone Balocco, F.M. Sukno, C. Hoogendoorn, C. Tobon-Gomez, G. Avegliano, et al. (2016). Left-ventricular Epi- and Endocardium Extraction from 3D Ultrasound Images Using an Automatically Constructed 3D ASM. CMBBE - Computer Methods in Biomechanics and Biomedical Engineering: Imaging and Visualization, 4(5), 265–280.
Abstract: In this paper, we propose an automatic method for constructing an active shape model (ASM) to segment the complete cardiac left ventricle in 3D ultrasound (3DUS) images, which avoids costly manual landmarking. The automatic construction of the ASM has already been addressed in the literature; however, the direct application of these methods to 3DUS is hampered by a high level of noise and artefacts. Therefore, we propose to construct the ASM by fusing the multidetector computed tomography data, to learn the shape, with the artificially generated 3DUS, in order to learn the neighbourhood of the boundaries. Our artificial images were generated by two approaches: a faster one that does not take into account the geometry of the transducer, and a more comprehensive one, implemented in Field II toolbox. The segmentation accuracy of our ASM was evaluated on 20 patients with left-ventricular asynchrony, demonstrating plausibility of the approach.
Keywords: ASM; cardiac segmentation; statistical model; shape model; 3D ultrasound; cardiac segmentation
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