Patent attributes
Method for performing segmentation of an interior vessel within the body of a patient, the method including obtaining a sequence of intravascular ultrasound images of an interior vessel and dividing the sequence into batches, detecting uninformative regions in each of the batches, the uninformative regions arising from an acoustic shadow cast by guide wire and by calcified plaque within the interior vessel, extracting a preliminary outer boundary of the interior vessel, tracking images in each of the batches to counter various distortions, performing statistical analysis and spatial integration on each of the batches to obtain a classification of blood and tissue regions, extracting a secondary outer boundary of the interior vessel utilizing the classification of blood and tissue regions and refining result, and extracting the inner boundary of the interior vessel based on the classification of blood and tissue regions.