Skin Lesion Diagnosis

This paper proposes a content-based image retrieval system for skin lesion images as a diagnostic aid. The aim is to support decision making by retrieving and displaying relevant past cases visually similar to the one under examination. Skin lesions of five common classes, including two non-melanoma cancer types are used. Colour and texture features are extracted from lesions. Feature selection is achieved by optimising a similarity matching function. Experiments on our database of 208 images are performed and results evaluated.

This paper presents a seed finding method for region growing segmentation approach using color channel energy in image regions. Instead of using the RGB system separated for each pixel, the proposal uses the energy on each color channel to improve the range of the possible values, then  creates a more specific seed to detail different regions. Region size used to calculate energy was adjusted to verify the proposed method. Images used were real wound photos, taken from patients undergoing treatment at the university hospital. Results showed that energy on regions presents enough information to segment, leading to a high percentage of matching with experts marks.

Keywords: Medical Computing, Image Segmentation, Skin
Lesion Recognition, Region Growing Algorithm Seed.

This paper shows that adding 3D depth information to RGB colour images improves segmentation of pigmented and non-pigmented skin lesion. A region-based active contour segmentation approach using a statistical model based on the level-set framework is presented. We consider what kinds of properties (e.g., colour, depth, texture) are most discriminative. The experiments show that our proposed method integrating chromatic and geometric information produces segmentation results for pigmented lesions close to dermatologists and more consistent and accurate results for non-pigmented lesions.

Ovine herpesvirus 2(OvHV-2) was recently isolated from unusual symptomatically infected native sheep in Egypt, 2013. The isolated virus was characterized as herpesvirus with negative staining and positive staining electron microscopy (EM). Further identification using agar gel precipitation test (AGPT) and finally confirmation with virus neutralization test (VNT). Based on clinical signs, epidemiological data and laboratory diagnosis with virological methods, our results denoted that the tested sheep were infected with OvHV-2. On conclusion, the current study illustrated that OvHV-2 could be isolated in vitro using specific pathogen free-embryonated chicken eggs (SPF-ECE) and Madden Derby Bovine Kidney (MDBK) cell culture. Further studies as sequencing of OvHV-2 had been isolated from sheep in this study is recommended to know if this virus diverges over time or during circulation among susceptible hosts and comparing its sequence to that had been isolated before from cattle and buffalos in Egypt, 2012. [Iman M. Bastawecy, Sobhy, N. M., Abd El-Samee, A. A. Recent isolation of ovine herpesvirus 2 from unusual symptomatic infection of sheep in Egypt. Life Sci.

40th Annual Meeting of the Society for Cutaneous Ultrastructure Research (SCUR)
6th Joint Meeting with the Society for Skin Structure Research (SSSR, Japan)
12–14 May 2013 SALZBURG, AUSTRIA*
* Editors:
H. HINTNER, J.W. BAUER, A. ISHIKO, A. ORLANDI, M. BEDONI, M. HAFTEK, V. HUCK, M. TANAKA, W. MUSS

-1-GENERAL DATA, AWARDS          (Presenters are underlined)    p. 1169
-2-INVITED LECTURES:                    I-01 – I-09                                p. 1170-1171
-3-ORAL PRESENTATIONS:            O-01 – O-22                              p. 1172-1175
-4-POSTER PRESENTATIONS:        P-01 – P-20

JID-4 pdf's:

-1-SCUR2013Abstr.(1=Gen.data,awards)_jid2013536(pdf).pdf
Journal of Investigative Dermatology (2014) 134, 1169; doi:10.1038/jid.2013.536

-2-SCUR2013Abstr.(2=invited)_jid2013537(pdf).pdf
Journal of Investigative Dermatology (2014) 134, 1170-1171;

-3-SCUR2013Abstr.(3=Oral)_jid2013538(pdf).pdf
Journal of Investigative Dermatology (2014) 134, 1172-1175;

-4-SCUR2013Abstr.(4=Poster)_JID2013539(pdf).pdf
Journal of Investigative Dermatology (2014) 134, 1176-1179;

Skin lesion segmentation and classification are crucial processes due to the visual resemblance among the benign and melanoma lesions. Robust and effective skin lesion classification is a major task to attain proficient skin lesion diagnosis. Because of the unclear boundaries among the tumor and skin, the segmentation of skin lesion becomes a tedious task. This paper presents a new deep transfer learning (DTL) based segmentation and classification model for diagnosing skin lesions from dermoscopic images. The presented model initially performs bilateral filtering based preprocessing to discard the noise exist in the image. In addition, Noninteractive GrabCut Algorithm is applied to perform the image segmentation process. Afterward, DTL model based on VGGNet-19 Network is utilized to extract a useful set of feature vectors. At last, extreme gradient boosting (XGBoost) and Linear Discriminant Analysis (LDA) models are used to identify the different class labels of skin lesions. For validating the proficient diagnosis outcome of the proposed model, a series of simulations were performed to exhibit the supreme performance of the presented method. From the obtained set of simulations, it is apparent that the VGG19-XGBoost model has outperformed the compared methods with the maximum sensitivity of 95.08%, specificity of 99.17%, and accuracy of 98.65%.

Malignant catarrhal fever (MCF) is a lymphoproliferative multisystemic fatal syndrome of many domestic and wild animals. The present study was conducted on animals of different species (cattle, buffalos and sheep). The clinical examination revealed high persistent fever, corneal opacity, mucoprulent oronasal discharges, mucosal lesions and ulcerative skin lesions. Examined sheep showed no clinical signs. Peripheral blood leukocytic (pb1) samples were collected for laboratory investigations. Semi nested polymerase chain reaction (PCR) assay have been used. Sequencing and phylogenetic analysis were performed for the positive PCR products. Positive staining electron microscopy (EM) and histopathology were also performed. Ovine herpesvirus 2 (OvHV-2) DNA was detected in PBL of 25 animals (12 cattle, 2 buffaloes and 11 sheep). The phylogenetic analysis of the OvHV-2 PCR products revealed 100% identity with the OvHV-2 strains of Brazil, USA and India. The positive staining EM detected herpesviral particles. The histopathological examination showed pansystemic vasculitis with lymphocytic infiltration in lymphoid and non lymphoid organs.

An 8-year-old boy went in my private dental practice for a
control of a deciduous tooth. The child is in good general health
and the parents did not report any health problems. The deciduous
element in the right jawbone was extremely compromised and
with sharp edges that was creating small wounds in the patient’s
mouth. It was decided to carry out the avulsion of the element.
A mepivacaine anesthesia with 1: 100,000 adrenalines, in vials
of 1.8 cl was administrated. The local anesthesia was injected on
the alveolar mucosa near the deciduous element. The extraction
was performed with a straight lever within a few minutes. The
post-surgical wound was medicated with cotton rolls and after
15 minutes the patient was discharged. 12 hours later the parents
of the child called back to see the child who had a lesion on the
right cheek, the same where the avulsion was performed. The
patient showed an area of about 4.5 cm of larger diameter, abraded
and brown. The child reported a burning sensation. The alveolar
mucosa in the site of avulsion was in good condition, there were
no lymph node swelling, the post-extraction site was not painful.
The patient was not an allergic subject. A more detailed anamnestic
investigation showed that the child did not feel the right cheek
after anesthesia and had rubbed the back of his hand several
times on the cheek and without knowing it, had caused the skin
lesion. Application of Aloe vera gel 2 times a day for 7 days was
prescribed to reduce burning sensation and to improve the healing.

Dermoscopy technique is widely used for image acquisition in diagnosis of skin cancer. Artefacts such as air bubbles, ruler markings and hair which are covering skin affect the segmentation process. To improve the accuracy of segmentation, it is necessary to remove these artefacts. Also, it is possible that low contrast of dermoscopic image can give poor results of segmentation. So contrast of dermoscopic image has to be increased. This paper shows results of artefact removal and contrast enhancement for dermoscopic images using different image processing techniques.

A tropical forest is a hostile environment for humans. The military physician supporting these immersion activities must cope with varied clinical situations with limited resources to reduce operational unavailability. This article reports a prospective cross-sectional epidemiologic study conducted from January to May 2012, observing the daily activity at sick call during the rainy season at the tropical forest training center (CEFE) advanced jungle commando training, located in French Guyana. The aim was to observe the distribution of traumatic injuries and specific diseases in this tropical environment. In all, 9,221 army staff members participated in the training (mean age: 30.8 years) during the 120-day study period. There were 486 medical visits, for a mean daily incidence of 5.3% (trainees: 83.8%, trainers: 16.5%). Skin lesions were most frequent (39%), principally irritative dermatitis and skin maceration (moisture/dressing associated dermatitis). A third (34%) of these conditions were due to trauma, mainly limb contusions and ligament injuries. Tropical diseases accounted for 3% of the reasons for consultation, with rare problems related to equatorial fauna or flora. The remaining conditions (24%) were not specific to the environment or activity. Operational attrition averaged five days. Removal from the training course was necessary in 13.8% of the cases. In an isolated area with a demanding environment , edical practice in a tropical forest requires health prevention actions and close medical follow-up. The permanent presence of a physician provides both care and expertise and is an important asset for both trainees and trainers.
La forêt équatoriale est un environnement hostile pour l’homme. Le médecin militaire soutenant des activités en immersion doit faire face à des situations cliniques variées avec des moyens limités pour réduire l’indisponibilité opérationnelle. Etude épidémiologique prospective transversale de janvier à mai 2012 observant, en saison des pluies, l’activité quotidienne de consultation médicale du Centre d’entrainement en forêt équatoriale (CEFE), pôle d’excellence dans l’aguerrissement commando en jungle situé en Guyane. Le but était d’observer la répartition des affections traumatiques et les pathologies spécifiques de l’environnement équatorial. Durant 120 jours, 9221 personnels ont été inclus (âge moyen de 30,8 ans ). Pour 486 consultations l’incidence moyenne des consultations était de 5,3% par jour (stagiaires : 83,8%, encadrement : 16,5%). Les lésions cutanées étaient majoritaires (39%), principalement des dermites irritatives et de macération. Un tiers (34%) des affections étaient traumatiques, en majorité des contusions et lésions ligamentaires des membres. Les maladies tropicales représentaient 3% des motifs de consultations avec de rares problèmes liées à la faune ou à la flore équatoriale. Le reste des affections (24%) étaient non spécifiques du milieu ou de l’activité. L’attrition opérationnelle était de 5 jours en moyenne . Un arrêt définitif de l’entrainement a été nécessaire dans 13,8% des cas. En milieu isolé, dans un environnement exigeant, l’exercice médical en forêt équatoriale impose des actions de prévention sanitaire et un suivi médical au plus près. Entre soins et expertise, la présence permanente du médecin est un véritable atout pour les stagiaires et l’encadrement.

This paper gives an example of evolved features that improve image retrieval performance. A content-based image retrieval system for skin lesion images is presented. The aim is to support decision making by retrieving and displaying relevant past cases visually similar to the one under examination. Skin lesions of five common classes, including two non-melanoma cancer types, are used. Colour and texture features are extracted from lesions. Evolutionary algorithms are used to create composite features that optimise a similarity matching function. Experiments on our database of 533 images are performed and results are compared to those obtained using simple features. The use of the evolved composite features improves the precision by about 7%.

A bovine herpes viru-2 (BHV-2) was recently isolated for the first time from a cow with generalized BHV-2 infection which is called pseudo-lumpy skin disease. The isolated virus was identified with negative staining electron microscope (EM), Polymerase chain reaction (PCR) and sequence analysis for the PCR product. Further serological investigations are recommended to differentiate carriers from susceptible cattle because the latency of herpesvirus infections is consistently characterized by a positive serologic status. Nucleotidesequence data must be submitted to GenBank to certain the strain isolated and described in the current study.

Skin lesions of Holstein cattle, native breeds of sheep and dromedary camels suspected to be caused by ovine herpesvirus 2(OvHV-2) was investigated by isolation, identification and confirmation. Isolation was performed in Madden Derby bovine kidney (MDBK) cell culture and chorioallantoic membrane (CAM) of specific pathogen free-embryonated chicken eggs (SPF-ECE). Identification was carried out by negative and positive staining electron microscopy (EM) with agar gel precipitation test (AGPT) as herpesvirus. Confirmation was achieved using virus neutralization test (VNT) after isolation in the MDBK cell cultures. Our results denoted that the tested animals were infected with OvHV-2. On conclusion, the current study illustrated that OvHV-2 can cause skin lesions only or skin lesions with other symptoms in susceptible animals. EM is recommended as front line to give "open view" along with AGPT for identification and confirmation with VNT when different viral causes were suspected. Epidemiological studies to know factors control form or symptoms of malignant catarrhal fever (MCF) in susceptible animals are also recommended with further researches for the possibility of OvHV-2 to infect humans because there is strong suspicion for infection of contact persons (including children) with infected animals, material or samples. [Iman , M. Bastawecy; Hend, M. El Damaty; Elshaima, M. Fawzi and El-Said, H Ovine herpesvirus 2 can cause skin lesions in susceptible animals] Am., Sci., 2015;11 (2):102-107]. (ISSN:1545-1003).

Fifty-six mice were classified into four groups; Group A (control group, n=8), Group B (exposure group, n=16), Group C (n=16) treated with sunscreen 15 minutes before UVB irradiations and group D (n=16) sunscreen treated 60 minutes before UVB exposure. Mice were irradiated 30 minutes 5days/week (12 weeks), and group C-D treated five days/week (12 weeks). Skin samples were taken in the mid and end of the experiment. The result of this study revealed that, epidermal thickness in group A was 7.155μm. At the mid-period of the experiment, severe epidermal hyperplasia was observed in group B with epidermal thickness 118.712μm, while in group C and D mild to moderate epidermal hyperplasia were noted with decreasing epidermal thickness to 64.154 and 90.042μm respectively. At the end of the experiment in Group B epidermal thickness reached to 281.35μm with seborrheic keratosis development, whereas in group C and D totally inhibited the development of seborrheic keratosis and epidermal thickness decreased again into 42.347 and 55.915μm. In conclusion, chronic UVB radiation-led to epidermal hyperplasia and seborrheic keratosis, sunscreen prevented the development of seborrheic keratosis and decreased the UVB-induced epidermal hyperplasia.