A PC-based X-ray image enhancement, archiving and feature extraction

X-ray imaging has long been used to analyze and determine the health condition of a person. However, x-ray plates are at times spacious to store and time consuming to segregate. This thesis paper talks about a low-cost way to hasten the segregation process of a patient\u27s chest x-ray film by digitizing the x-ray film and storing it in a database. For acquiring the digitized x-ray films, the films are illuminated using a negatoscope and captured using a digital camera. A commercially available compact digital camera is chosen and qualified based on lens characteristics, resolution, and configurability. After acquisition, the image has pertinent information that is indiscernible. Therefore, image enhancement through MATLAB is introduced in the image. The enhancement techniques used in this study involve a combination of special filters and image diffusion. These special filters include Gradient and Laplacian filters basically used for edge enhancement and image sharpening, while the image diffusion which is an anisotropic diffusion reduces noise while preserving the details. After enhancement, these images are archived in a database programmed through PHP MySQL and designed to hold large amounts of data with basic search features and user authentication. The image is viewed in a web-based graphical user interface programmed through Java Applet with added features of distance and angle measurements. The system is able to validly digitize 95.65% of the sample images and subsequently archiving these images