Segmentation of points of interest during fetal cardiac assesment in the first trimester from color Doppler ultrasound
This is an incremental improvement for obstetricians in fetal cardiac screening.
The study tackled the problem of segmenting points of interest in fetal cardiac assessment from first-trimester color Doppler ultrasound by using Zernike moments for feature extraction and a distance-based approach for classification, resulting in a computational tool that shows promise for rapid recognition of heart views during screening.
The present paper puts forward an incipient study that uses a traditional segmentation method based on Zernike moments for extracting significant features from frames of fetal echocardiograms from first trimester color Doppler examinations. A distance based approach is then used on the obtained indicators to classify frames of three given categories that should be present in a normal heart condition. The computational tool shows promise in supporting the obstetrician in a rapid recognition of heart views during screening.