Can a Machine Outperform a Radiologist in Interpreting Ultrasound Images?
Georgia Georgiou – ggeo@cbis.ece.drexel.edu Fernand S. Cohen – fscohen@coe.drexel.edu ECE Dept., Drexel University, 32nd and Chestnut Streets Philadelphia, PA 19104 Popular version of paper 5aSP5 Presented Friday morning, June 26, 1998 ICA/ASA 98, Seattle, WA Ultrasound is in general a safe and low cost medical imaging technique, with most of the cost being the radiologist’s time for examining the ultrasound image. Unfortunately there are some problems associated with it that make its use as a reliable mean for early breast cancer detection quite limited. Several clinical studies have shown that ultrasound is rather incapable of reliably detecting cancers in the breast that were not also evident by physical examination or mammography. This happens because the use of ultrasound imaging of the breast is still based on the radiologist who observes the images. The extracted visible information is limited because of the relatively low resolution of the imaging system. Unfortunately, the res
