Patent attributes
System and methods for automatically identifying anatomical regions in medical images are disclosed. A signature is computed from one or more images of a patient. The signature comprises a water equivalent diameter distribution generated from one or more images of the patient. A best matching atlas element is identified from an atlas. The atlas includes a group of atlas elements, each atlas element includes landmarks associated with a set of image data, and a signature associated with the set of image data. The signature of the best matching atlas element matches the signature of the patient the best among the atlas. Landmarks of the best matching atlas element are projected onto an image of the patient. The method can be used on its own for anatomy localization or used in conjunction with another anatomy localization method to correct the result of another method.