Computer-Assisted Detection of Cemento-Enamel Junction in Intraoral Ultrasonographs

The cemento-enamel junction (CEJ) is an important reference point for various clinical measurements in oral health assessment. Identifying CEJ in ultrasound images is a challenging task for dentists. In this study, a computer-assisted detection method is proposed to identify the CEJ in ultrasound im...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Applied sciences 2021-07, Vol.11 (13), p.5850
Main Authors: Nguyen, Kim-Cuong T., Yan, Yuening, Kaipatur, Neelambar R., Major, Paul W., Lou, Edmond H., Punithakumar, Kumaradevan, Le, Lawrence H.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
cemento-enamel junction
Cementum
Dental enamel
Dentistry
dento-periodontium
Disease
Edge detection
Enamel
high-frequency ultrasound
Image acquisition
Image enhancement
Image processing
landmark detection
Medical equipment
Noise
oral health
Orthodontics
Preprocessing
Radiation
Radiography
Ultrasonic imaging
Ultrasound
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Summary:The cemento-enamel junction (CEJ) is an important reference point for various clinical measurements in oral health assessment. Identifying CEJ in ultrasound images is a challenging task for dentists. In this study, a computer-assisted detection method is proposed to identify the CEJ in ultrasound images, based on the curvature change of the junction outlining the upper edge of the enamel and cementum at the cementum–enamel intersection. The technique consists of image preprocessing steps for image enhancement, segmentation, and edge detection to locate the boundary of the enamel and cementum. The effects of the image preprocessing and the sizes of the bounding boxes enclosing the CEJ were studied. For validation, the algorithm was applied to 120 images acquired from human volunteers. The mean difference of the best performance between the proposed method and the two raters’ measurements was an average of 0.25 mm with reliability ≥ 0.98. The proposed method has the potential to assist dental professionals in CEJ identification on ultrasonographs to provide better patient care.
ISSN:2076-3417
2076-3417
DOI:10.3390/app11135850