A method for real-time vascular modeling and assessment is disclosed. Modeling, in some embodiments, comprises receiving a plurality of 2-D angiographic images of a portion of a vasculature of a subject, and processing the images to automatically detect 2-D features, for example, paths along vascular extents, which are projected into 3-D to determine homologous features among blood vessels and construct 3-D vascular extents and determine other vascular characteristics. Assessment, in some embodiments, comprises processing models selectively different from one another to produce one or more vascular indexes which indicate a diagnostic preference, for example, to perform a medical intervention such as a stent implantation. Speed is achieved, for example, by the method being optimized for determining the effects of a medical intervention. In some embodiments, results are produced quickly enough to allow use of the method to perform PCI within the same catheterization used to perform diagnostic imaging.

A radiography apparatus and a method for controlling the radiography apparatus are provided. The radiography apparatus includes a radiographer configured to acquire a first radiation image of a subject before a contrast reagent is injected into the subject, and acquire a second radiation image of the subject after the contrast reagent is injected into the subject. The radiography apparatus further includes an image processor configured to calculate a difference between data of a pixel of the first radiation image and data of a pixel of the second radiation image, for each of pixels of the first radiation image, and acquire an image of the subject based the difference for each of the pixels of the first radiation image.

A method of processing a 3D OCT dataset is present. A method according to some embodiments of the present invention includes obtaining an OCT data from the 3D OCT dataset; obtaining an OCTA data from the 3D OCT dataset; performing segmentation for at least one boundary on the OCT data; processing the OCTA data in a region of interest to create at least one image representation by assigning a value to each pixel of each of the image representation; and displaying at least one image representation.

Methods and systems for suppressing shadowgraphic flow projection artifacts in OCT angiography images of a sample are disclosed. In one example approach, normalized OCT angiography data is analyzed at the level of individual A-scans to classify signals as either flow or projection artifact. This classification information is then used to suppress projection artifacts in the three dimensional OCT angiography dataset.

Systems and methods for analyzing pathologies utilizing quantitative imaging are presented herein. Advantageously, the systems and methods of the present disclosure utilize a hierarchical analytics framework that identifies and quantify biological properties/analytes from imaging data and then identifies and characterizes one or more pathologies based on the quantified biological properties/analytes. This hierarchical approach of using imaging to examine underlying biology as an intermediary to assessing pathology provides many analytic and processing advantages over systems and methods that are configured to directly determine and characterize pathology from underlying imaging data.

Systems and methods are disclosed for assessing the severity of plaque and/or stenotic lesions using contrast distribution predictions and measurements. One method includes: receiving patient-specific images of a patient's vasculature and a measured distribution of a contrast agent delivered through the patient's vasculature; associating the measured distribution of the contrast agent with a patient-specific anatomic model of the patient's vasculature; defining physiological and boundary conditions of a blood flow model of the patient's blood flow and pressure; simulating the distribution of the contrast agent through the patient-specific anatomic model; comparing the measured distribution of the contrast agent and the simulated distribution of the contrast agent through the patient-specific anatomic model to determine whether a similarity condition is satisfied; and updating the defined physiological and boundary conditions and re-simulating distribution of the contrast agent through the one or more points of the patient-specific anatomic model until the similarity condition is satisfied.

According to one embodiment, an image processing apparatus includes processing circuitry. The processing circuitry obtains a parameter value representing temporal information on blood flow for each pixel of multiple image data items, and generates a parameter image by determining a pixel value of each pixel according to the parameter value representing the temporal information on blood flow. The processing circuitry further generates a composite image of an X-ray fluoroscopic image of an object obtained in real time and a road map image using at least a part of the parameter image, and causes a display to display the composite image.

An embodiment of the invention receives by an interface a retinal image from a patient, and identifies by a feature extraction device vessel fragments in the retinal image. The vessel fragments include at least a portion of a major vessel and at least a portion of a branch connected to a major vessel. A processor computes estimated blood flow velocities in the vessel fragments with a blood flow velocity estimation model and determines actual blood flow velocities in the vessel fragments. An analysis engine compares the actual blood flow velocities in the vessel fragments to the estimated blood flow velocities in the vessel fragments. The analysis engine detects a candidate plaque affected vessel fragment when the estimated blood flow velocities in the vessel fragments differs from the actual blood flow velocities in the vessel fragments by a predetermined amount.

A vascular assessment apparatus is disclosed. The apparatus is configured to receive medical images of a coronary vessel tree of a subject from a medical imaging device and analyze the medical images to identify vessel segments within the coronary vessel tree. For each identified vessel segment, the apparatus is configured to analyze portions of the segment to determine at least one of a radius, diameter, or cross-sectional area of the vessel segment at the analyzed portions, determine resistances for the analyzed portions of the vessel segment based the radius, diameter, or the cross-sectional area at the analyzed portions, and combine the determined resistances for the analyzed portions of the vessel segment to determine a total resistance of the each identified vessel segment and calculate an index indicative of vascular function based on the determined flow rates.

The present invention relates to a method for characterizing perfusion abnormalities in tissue by means of fractal analysis (FA) of at least one part of an interface region between adequately and abnormally perfused tissue comprising the steps of providing an imaging dataset of perfusion imaging; wherein said imaging dataset visualizes the at least one part of the interface region; optional pre-processing of said imaging dataset; applying fractal analysis to the imaging dataset; wherein said fractal analysis provides at least one fractal parameter, preferably fractal dimension (FD), of the at least one part of the interface region.