Pre-processing importance for extracting contours from noisy echocardiographic images

• Main Authors: Hussein, Zinah Rajab, O. K. Rahmat, Rahmita Wirza, Abdullah, Lili Nurliyana, Saripan, M. Iqbal, Dimon, Mohd Zamrin
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: IJCSNS 2009
• Online Access: http://psasir.upm.edu.my/id/eprint/16320/1/Pre.pdf; http://psasir.upm.edu.my/id/eprint/16320/; http://paper.ijcsns.org/07_book/html/200903/200903018.html

Contours extraction from two dimensional echocardiographic images has been a challenge in digital image processing. This is essentially due to the heavy noise, poor quality of these images and some artifacts like papillary muscles, intra-cavity structures as chordate, and valves that can interfere with the endocardial border tracking. In this paper, we will present a technique to extract the contours of heart boundaries from a sequence of echocardiographic images, where it started with pre-processing to reduce noise and produce better image quality. By pre-processing the images, the unclear edges are avoided, and we can get an accurate detection of both heart boundary and movement of heart valves.