Mapping of literature onto regions of interest on neurological images

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-9390233-B2
Application number	US-201213452331-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Apr 20, 2012
Priority date	Jun 18, 2008
Publication date	Jul 12, 2016
Grant date	Jul 12, 2016

Abstract

A computer implemented method, apparatus, and computer program product for analyzing neurological images. A set of brain scans for a patient is compared to a set of baseline control scans to automatically identify regions of interest in the set of patient scans. A region of interest is an area in a scan that shows an indication of a potential abnormality. A set of electronic medical literature sources is searched for medical literature relevant to the regions of interest in the set of patient scans. The relevant medical literature is correlated to the medical literature describing the regions of interest in the set of patient scans to the regions of interest in the set of patient scans. A result is generated. The result comprises the regions of interest and a set of links to the correlated portions of the relevant medical literature are outputted.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A method of analyzing neurological images, the method comprising:
comparing, by a processor, a set of brain scans for a patient to a set of baseline control scans to automatically identify a set of regions of interest in the set of patient scans, wherein a region of interest is an area in a scan that shows an indication of a potential abnormality;
searching, by the processor, a set of electronic medical literature sources for medical literature relevant to the set of regions of interest in the set of patient scans to form relevant medical literature;
correlating, by the processor, portions of the relevant medical literature describing the set of regions of interest in the set of patient scans to the set of regions of interest in the set of patient scans to form correlated portions of the relevant medical literature;
generating, by the processor, a result, wherein the result comprises the set of patient scans and a set of links to the correlated portions of the relevant medical literature; and
embedding, by the processor, the set of links to the correlated portions of the relevant medical literature within the set of patient scans, wherein a user selects a link in the embedded set of links within the set of patient scans to view a portion of the correlated portions of the relevant medical literature describing a region of interest in the set of regions of interest in the set of patient scans.

2. The method of claim 1 wherein portions of the relevant medical literature describing the set of regions of interest in the set of patient scans comprises a set of brain scans in the relevant medical literature showing areas of a brain having an identified abnormality that corresponds to the potential abnormality shown in the set of regions of interest in the set of patient scans.

3. The method of claim 1 further comprising:
presenting, by the processor, the set of regions of interest to the user;
responsive to receiving a selection of a set of additional regions of interest in the set of patient scans from the user to form a set of user selected regions of interest, the processor adding the set of user selected region of interest to the set of regions of interest in the set of patient scans; and
responsive to receiving a selection of a set of undesired regions of interest in the set of patient scans from the user to form a set of de-selected regions of interest, the processor removing the set of de-selected regions of interest from the set of regions of interest in the set of patient scans.

4. The method of claim 1 wherein searching, by the processor, the set of electronic medical literature sources further comprises:
identifying, by the processor, the set of electronic medical literature sources; and
searching, by the processor, medical literature available from the set of electronic medical literature sources using at least one of data mining, search engines, and queries to identify the relevant medical literature in the medical literature available from the set of electronic medical literature sources.

5. The method of claim 1 wherein the set of baseline control scans comprises a set of baseline normal scans, and further comprising:
receiving, by the processor, a set of brain scans for a set of healthy subjects in various demographic groups to form the baseline normal scans; and
analyzing, by the processor, the baseline normal scans to identify a normal appearance of areas in normal brain scans, wherein a normal brain scan is a scan that does not show indications of disease or abnormalities in the areas in the normal brain scans.

6. The method of claim 1 wherein the set of baseline control scans comprises a set of baseline abnormal scans, and further comprising:
receiving, by the processor, a set of brain scans for a set of subjects in various demographic groups having identified abnormalities in the set of brain scans to form the baseline abnormal scans; and
analyzing, by the processor, the baseline abnormal scans to identify an abnormal appearance of areas in brain scans, wherein an abnormal scan is a scan that shows indications of disease or abnormalities in the areas of the brain scans.

7. The method of claim 1 wherein the set of brain scans comprises a set of positron emission tomography scans of the patient.

8. The method of claim 1 wherein the set of brain scans comprises a set of magnetic resonance imaging scans of the patient.

9. A computer program product for analyzing neurological images, the computer program product comprising:
a non-transitory computer readable storage device having computer usable program code embodied therewith, the computer usable program code comprising:
computer usable program code configured to compare a set of brain scans for a patient to a set of baseline control scans to automatically identify set of regions of interest in the set of patient scans, wherein a region of interest is an area in a scan that shows an indication of a potential abnormality;
computer usable program code configured to search a set of electronic medical literature sources for medical literature relevant to the set of regions of interest in the set of patient scans to form relevant medical literature;
computer usable program code configured to correlate portions of the relevant medical literature describing the set of regions of interest in the set of patient scans to the set of regions of interest in the set of patient scans to form correlated portions of the relevant medical literature;
computer usable program code configured to generate a result, wherein the result comprises the set of patient scans and a set of links to the correlated portions of the relevant medical literature; and
computer usable program code configured to embed the set of links to the correlated portions of the relevant medical literature within the set of patient scans, wherein a user selects a link in the embedded set of links within the set of patient scans to view a portion of the correlated portions of the relevant medical literature describing a region of interest in the set of regions of interest in the set of patient scans.

10. The computer program product of claim 9 wherein portions of the relevant medical literature describing the set of regions of interest in the set of patient scans comprises a set of brain scans in the relevant medical literature showing areas of a brain having an identified abnormality that corresponds to the potential abnormality shown in the set of regions of interest in the set of patient scans.

11. The computer program product of claim 9 further comprising:
computer usable program code configured to present the set of regions of interest to the user;
computer usable program code configured to add a set of user selected regions of interest to the set of regions of interest in the set of patient scans in response to receiving a selection of a set of additional regions of interest in the set of patient scans from the user to form the set of user selected regions of interest; and
computer usable program code configured to remove a set of de-selected regions of interest from the set of regions of interest in the set of patient scans in response to receiving a selection of a set of undesired regions of interest in the set of patient scans from the user to form the set of de-selected regions of interest.

12. The computer program product of claim 9 wherein searching the set of electronic medical literature sources further comprising:
computer usable program code configured to identify the set of electronic medical literature sources; and
computer usable program code configured to search medical literature available fro

Assignees

• Fueyo Joanna Lynn
• Angell Robert Lee
• Friedlander Robert R
• Kraemer James R
• IBM

Inventors

• Fueyo Joanna Lynn
• Angell Robert Lee
• Friedlander Robert R
• Kraemer James R

Classifications

• G06F19/3443

  Physics · mapped topic

• G06F19/324

  Physics · mapped topic

• G06F19/321

  Physics · mapped topic

• G06F19/345 Primary

  Physics · mapped topic

• G06T2207/20104

  Interactive definition of region of interest [ROI] · CPC title