Classifying Chinese Medicine Constitution Using Multimodal Deep-Learning Model.

OBJECTIVE: To develop a multimodal deep-learning model for classifying Chinese medicine constitution, i.e., the balanced and unbalanced constitutions, based on inspection of tongue and face images, pulse waves from palpation, and health information from a total of 540 subjects. METHODS: This study data consisted of tongue and face images, pulse waves obtained by palpation, and health information, including personal information, life habits, medical history, and current symptoms, from 540 subjects (202 males and 338 females). Convolutional neural networks, recurrent neural networks, and fully connected neural networks were used to extract deep features from the data. Feature fusion and decision fusion models were constructed for the multimodal data. RESULTS: The optimal models for tongue and face images, pulse waves and health information were ResNet18, Gate Recurrent Unit, and entity embedding, respectively. Feature fusion was superior to decision fusion. The multimodal analysis revealed that multimodal data compensated for the loss of information from a single mode, resulting in improved classification performance. CONCLUSIONS: Multimodal data fusion can supplement single model information and improve classification performance. Our research underscores the effectiveness of multimodal deep learning technology to identify body constitution for modernizing and improving the intelligent application of Chinese medicine.

Gabor-based anisotropic diffusion with lattice Boltzmann method for medical ultrasound despeckling.

Medical ultrasound images are corrupted by speckle noise, and despeckling methods are required to effectively and efficiently reduce speckle noise while simultaneously preserving details of tissues. This paper proposes a despeckling approach named the Gabor-based anisotropic diffusion coupled with the lattice Boltzmann method (GAD-LBM), which uses the lattice Boltzmann method (LBM) to fast solve the partial differential equation of an anisotropic diffusion model embedded with the Gabor edge detector. We evaluated the GAD-LBM on both synthetic and clinical ultrasound images, and the experimental results suggested that the GAD-LBM was superior to other nine methods in speckle suppression and detail preservation. For synthetic and clinical images, the computation time of the GAD-LBM was about 1/90 to 1/20 of the GAD solved with the finite difference, indicating the advantage of the GAD-LBM in efficiency. The GAD-LBM not only has excellent ability of noise reduction and detail preservation for ultrasound images, but also has advantages in computational efficiency.

Area and volume ratios for prediction of visual outcome in idiopathic macular hole.

AIM: To predict the visual outcome in patients undergoing macular hole surgery by two novel three-dimensional morphological parameters on optical coherence tomography (OCT): area ratio factor (ARF) and volume ratio factor (VRF). METHODS: A clinical case series was conducted, including 54 eyes of 54 patients with an idiopathic macular hole (IMH). Each patient had an OCT examination before and after surgery. Morphological parameters of the macular hole, such as minimum diameter, base diameter, and height were measured. Then, the macular hole index (MHI), tractional hole index (THI), and hole form factor (HFF) were calculated. Meanwhile, novel postoperative macular hole (MH) factors, ARF and VRF were calculated by three-dimensional morphology. Bivariate correlations were performed to acquire asymptotic significance values between the steady best corrected visual acuity (BCVA) after surgery and 2D/3D arguments of MH by the Pearson method with two-tailed test. All significant factors were analyzed by the receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve analysis of SPSS software which were responsible for vision recovery. ROC curves analyses were performed to further discuss the different parameters on the prediction of visual outcome. RESULTS: The mean and standard deviation values of patients' age, symptoms duration, and follow-up time were 64.8±8.9y (range: 28-81), 18.6±11.5d (range: 2-60), and 11.4±0.4mo (range: 6-24), respectively. Steady-post-BCVA analyzed with bivariate correlations was found to be significantly correlated with base diameter (r=0.521, P<0.001), minimum diameter (r=0.514, P<0.001), MHI (r=-0.531, P<0.001), THI (r=-0.386, P=0.004), HFF (r=-0.508, P<0.001), and ARF (r=-0.532, P<0.001). Other characteristic parameters such as age, duration of surgery, height, diameter hole index, and VRF were not statistically significant with steady-post-BCVA. According to area under the curve (AUC) values, values of ARF, MHI, HFF, minimum diameter, THI, and base diameter are 0.806, 0.772, 0.750, 0.705, 0.690, and 0.686, respectively. However, Steady-post-BCVA analysis with bivariate correlations for VRF was no statistical significance. Results of ROC curve analysis indicated that the MHI value, HFF, and ARF was greater than 0.427, 1.027 and 1.558 respectively which could correlate with better visual acuity. CONCLUSION: Compared with MHI and HFF, ARF could effectively express three-dimensional characteristics of macular hole and achieve better sensitivity and specificity. Thus, ARF could be the most effective parameter to predict the visual outcome in macular hole surgery.

[The design and implementation of video processing system for medical electronic endoscopy].

This paper presents a medical electronic endoscopy real-time image acquisition and control system which consists of video codec chip, flash memory and FPGA. The hardware scheme and circuit design of the system is figured out, and the principle of ping-pong operation and the implementation of FPGA program is introduced. Experimental tests show that the designed system performs steadily, is easy to maintain, and reduces the cost greatly. The higher performance price ratio makes it have good application prospect in medical endoscopy.

[The design of smart data collection system for EHR].

This paper presents the design of smart data collection system to deal with the drawbacks like EHR data second hand input which is time-consuming and EHR's poor usability. The system comprises security certification, information management and data transmission modules. Through WLAN, EHR data can transmit between smart terminals and server. Also it provides a real-time communication platform for both terminal users and medical care personnel.

[Development of POCT and medical digital assistant for primary medical healthcare].

In this paper, we discuss the meaning, advantages and methods of applying the point of care testing (POCT) and medical digital assistant (MDA) to primary healthcare services. We also introduce the development of the POCT and MDA based on the electronic health record(EHR) system.

[A method used in myeloma cell cloning spot image segmentation].

A new interactive image segmentation method used in the multiple myeloma cloning spots image segmentation is presented in the paper. Based on the theory of graph cuts, some pixels are selected as the front object and the background seeds, and the other parts are treated as the unknown region. Then, an energy function is constructed and initialized through K-means, and the minimum cut method is used in the segmentation by energy minimization. Last, the image is eroded and dilated, and the cloning separate parts could be got effectively. For the pixels which may be partitioned wrongly, we use a tool similar to a brush to re-mark the front object or the background, and divide once again. Both subjective the evaluation criteria and the RUMA, evaluation criteria are used to evaluate the method, and the experiment results are satisfactory.

[Design of the software system of the platform for long-term blood pressure monitoring].

In this study, a platform for long-term and non-invasive blood pressure monitoring is proposed, Its software system and the functions of different program modules in the software system are introduced together with the development methods of the main modules.

[Design of the wireless medical information system based on PDA].

This paper introduces the design of the wireless medical information management system based on PDA and its model whose experiment results show that it can realize the functional requirements of the design.

[Wireless medical monitoring--current status and developments].

Wireless medical monitoring overcomes the limitations of conventional wired-monitoring, enabling people to get their physiological and pathological informations anytime and anywhere. This review summarizes the basic components and principles of wireless medical monitoring, including the techniques for measuring and transmitting vital signs. Its status,developments in R&D and applications are presented with a series of examples. Limitations and potential uses of wireless medical monitoring are also discussed.

[Design of the Medical Digital Assistant for "bottom of the pyramid"].

To meet the challenges such as raising the efficiency of medical resources, slowing the fastly-increasing medical costs and keeping the sustainability of the aging society and chronic diseases, this paper introduces a Medical Digital Assistant system for "BOP", which includes a mobile monitoring unit,a data transferring unit, and a managing unit, and presents the system's evaluating method. In addition, a new application model and the service workflow are discussed.

[Medical product designing model for the "BOP" in China].

China has a large population under the average economy. This group of people is often referred to those at the Bottom of the Pyramid (BOP). In order to meet their special medical needs, this paper is to discuss a topic on how to create medical products for the "BOP" in China, especially under sustainable developments based on the investigation and analysis in Shanghai. Also, a new possible development model including the government's support, knowledge exchange and communication is introduced.

[A web-based biomedical image mosaicing system].

This paper describes a web service for biomedical image mosaicing. A web site based on CGI (Common Gateway Interface) is implemented. The system is based on Browser/Server model and is tested in www. Finally implementation examples and experiment results are provided.