Influence of Expert-Dependent Variability over the Performance of Noninvasive Fibrosis Assessment in Patients with Chronic Hepatitis C by Means of Texture Analysis.pdfVIP

Hindawi Publishing Corporation Computational and Mathematical Methods in Medicine Volume 2012, Article ID 346713, 9 pages doi:10.1155/2012/346713 Research Article Influence of Expert-Dependent Variability over the Performance of Noninvasive Fibrosis Assessment in Patients with Chronic Hepatitis C by Means of Texture Analysis Cristian Vicas,1 Monica Lupsor,2 Mihai Socaciu,2 Sergiu Nedevschi,1 and Radu Badea2 1 Computer Science Department, Faculty of Automation and Computer Science, Technical University of Cluj-Napoca, 28 Gheoghe Baritiu Street, 400027 Cluj-Napoca, Romania 2 Regional Institute of Gastroenterology and Hepatology, Iuliu Hatieganu University of Medicine and Pharmacy, 19-21 Croitorilor Street, 400162 Cluj-Napoca, Romania Correspondence should be addressed to Cristian Vicas, cristian.vicas@cs.utcluj.ro Received 1 August 2011; Accepted 26 September 2011 Academic Editor: Carlo Cattani Copyright © 2012 Cristian Vicas et al. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. Texture analysis is viewed as a method to enhance the diagnosis power of classical B-mode ultrasound image. The present paper aims to evaluate and eliminate the dependence between the human expert and the performance of such a texture analysis system in predicting the cirrhosis in chronic hepatitis C patients. 125 consecutive chronic hepatitis C patients were included in this study. Ultrasound images were acquired from each patient and four human experts established regions of interest. Textural analysis tool was evaluated. The performance of this approach depends highly on the human expert that establishes the regions of interest