Fully automated deep learning based auto-contouring of liver segments and spleen on contrast-enhanced CT images.

Journal: Scientific reports
Published Date: Feb 26, 2024

Abstract

Manual delineation of liver segments on computed tomography (CT) images for primary/secondary liver cancer (LC) patients is time-intensive and prone to inter/intra-observer variability. Therefore, we developed a deep-learning-based model to auto-contour liver segments and spleen on contrast-enhanced CT (CECT) images. We trained two models using 3d patch-based attention U-Net ([Formula: see text] and 3d full resolution of nnU-Net ([Formula: see text] to determine the best architecture ([Formula: see text]. BA was used with vessels ([Formula: see text] and spleen ([Formula: see text] to assess the impact on segment contouring. Models were trained, validated, and tested on 160 ([Formula: see text]), 40 ([Formula: see text]), 33 ([Formula: see text]), 25 (C) and 20 (C) CECT of LC patients. [Formula: see text] outperformed [Formula: see text] across all segments with median differences in Dice similarity coefficients (DSC) ranging 0.03-0.05 (p < 0.05). [Formula: see text], and [Formula: see text] were not statistically different (p > 0.05), however, both were slightly better than [Formula: see text] by DSC up to 0.02. The final model, [Formula: see text], showed a mean DSC of 0.89, 0.82, 0.88, 0.87, 0.96, and 0.95 for segments 1, 2, 3, 4, 5-8, and spleen, respectively on entire test sets. Qualitatively, more than 85% of cases showed a Likert score [Formula: see text] 3 on test sets. Our final model provides clinically acceptable contours of liver segments and spleen which are usable in treatment planning.

Authors

  • Aashish C Gupta
    Department of Imaging Physics, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, TX, USA. acgupta1@mdanderson.org.
  • Guillaume Cazoulat
    Department of Imaging Physics, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, Texas.
  • Mais Al Taie
    Department of Imaging Physics, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, TX, USA.
  • Sireesha Yedururi
    From the Department of Abdominal Imaging, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston.
  • Bastien Rigaud
    Department of Imaging Physics, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, Texas. Electronic address: BSRigaud@mdanderson.org.
  • Austin Castelo
    Department of Imaging Physics, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, TX, USA.
  • John Wood
    Division of Radiation Oncology, Department of Radiation Oncology, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, TX.
  • Cenji Yu
    Department of Radiation Physics, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, TX 77030, United States; The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center UTHealth Houston Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences, Houston, TX 77030, United States.
  • Caleb O'Connor
    Department of Imaging Physics, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, TX, USA.
  • Usama Salem
    From the Departments of Abdominal Imaging (C.T.J., S.G., M.M.S., V.K.W., U.S., N.A.W.B.), Physics (X.L.), and Biostatistics (W.Q.), the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, 1400 Pressler St, Unit 1473, Houston, TX 77030-4009; and Center for Virtual Imaging Trials, Carl E. Ravin Advanced Imaging Laboratories, Clinical Imaging Physics Group, Medical Physics Graduate Program, Departments of Radiology, Physics, Biomedical Engineering, and Electrical and Computer Engineering, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, NC (E.S.).
  • Jessica Albuquerque Marques Silva
    Department of Interventional Radiology, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, TX, USA.
  • Aaron Kyle Jones
    Department of Imaging Physics, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, TX, USA.
  • Molly McCulloch
    Department of Imaging Physics, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, TX, USA.
  • Bruno C Odisio
    Department of Interventional Radiology, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, TX, USA.
  • Eugene J Koay
    Department of Radiation Oncology, MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, Texas.
  • Kristy K Brock
    Department of Imaging Physics, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, Texas; Department of Radiation Physics, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, Texas.

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