Automatic brain MRI motion artifact detection based on end-to-end deep learning is similarly effective as traditional machine learning trained on image quality metrics

• Published in: Medical image analysis 2023-08, Vol.88, p.102850-102850, Article 102850
• Main Authors: Vakli, Pál, Weiss, Béla, Szalma, János, Barsi, Péter, Gyuricza, István, Kemenczky, Péter, Somogyi, Eszter, Nárai, Ádám, Gál, Viktor, Hermann, Petra, Vidnyánszky, Zoltán
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Convolutional neural networks; Head motion; Image quality metrics; MRI artifacts; Support vector machine
• ISSN: 1361-8415; 1361-8423
• DOI: 10.1016/j.media.2023.102850

•N = 2072 brain MRI scans rated by neuroradiologists from a clinical perspective.•Lightweight 3D CNN achieves ∼94% balanced accuracy in identifying severe head motion.•SVM trained on IQMs achieves comparably high balanced accuracy of ∼88%.•No significant difference between models regarding confusion matrix, error rate, ROC. Head motion artifacts in magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) are an important confounding factor concerning brain research as well as clinical practice. For this reason, several machine learning-based methods have been developed for the automatic quality control of structural MRI scans. Deep learning offers a promising solution to this problem, however, given its data-hungry nature and the scarcity of expert-annotated datasets, its advantage over traditional machine learning methods in identifying motion-corrupted brain scans is yet to be determined. In the present study, we investigated the relative advantage of the two methods in structural MRI quality control. To this end, we collected publicly available T1-weighted images and scanned subjects in our own lab under conventional and active head motion conditions. The quality of the images was rated by a team of radiologists from the point of view of clinical diagnostic use. We present a relatively simple, lightweight 3D convolutional neural network trained in an end-to-end manner that achieved a test set (N = 411) balanced accuracy of 94.41% in classifying brain scans into clinically usable or unusable categories. A support vector machine trained on image quality metrics achieved a balanced accuracy of 88.44% on the same test set. Statistical comparison of the two models yielded no significant difference in terms of confusion matrices, error rates, or receiver operating characteristic curves. Our results suggest that these machine learning methods are similarly effective in identifying severe motion artifacts in brain MRI scans, and underline the efficacy of end-to-end deep learning-based systems in brain MRI quality control, allowing the rapid evaluation of diagnostic utility without the need for elaborate image pre-processing. [Display omitted]