Breast Cancer
Mammography is the most efficient method for early diagnosis of breast cancer. In Canada and the United States, mammography is used for early detection of breast cancer in asymptomatic women between the ages of 50 and 69 years, or women under the age of 40 years with high risk of breast cancer. In clinical diagnostic procedures, decisions are made based upon multiple mammographic features, which are used to classify a case as normal or abnormal. By studying the masses present in a mammogram, a radiologist can decide whether benign breast disease or cancer is present or not, and in the case of a positive finding, request a biopsy for a final diagnosis. However, studies have shown that the positive predictive value (PPV, given as the ratio of the number of breast cancers found to the total number of biopsies performed) of such procedures is only 15% to 30% (Kupinski, & Anastasio, 2009). Considering the traumatic nature and cost of biopsy, it is important to increase the PPV without reducing the sensitivity of mammography in breast cancer detection.
Several studies have shown the potential of computer-aided diagnosis (CAD) procedures in increasing the diagnostic accuracy by reducing the false-negative rate while increasing the PPV of diagnostic procedures based upon mammographic abnormalities (Rangayyan, Mudigonda, & Desautels, 2000; Hadjiiski, Sahiner, Chan, Petrick, & Helvie, 1999; Alto, Rangayyan, & Desautels, 2005; André, & Rangayyan, 2006; Mudigonda, Rangayyan, & Desautels, 2000; Mudigonda, Rangayyan, & Desautels, 2001; Sahiner, Chan, Petrick, Helvie, & Goodsitt, 1998; Sahiner, Chan, Petrick, Helvie, & Hadjiiski, 2001). Such procedures can decrease the risk of wrong diagnosis, help radiologists in the analysis of difficult cases, and help in deciding upon a recommendation of biopsy. CAD methods can be implemented to identify masses in a mammogram, to extract their features (such as measures of texture, edge-sharpness, and shape), and to classify them as benign or malignant (Rangayyan, Mudigonda, & Desautels, 2000; Hadjiiski, et al. 1999; Alto, et al. 2005; André, & Rangayyan, 2006; Mudigonda, et al. 2000; Mudigonda, Rangayyan, & Desautels, 2001; Sahiner, Chan, Petrick, Helvie, & Goodsitt, 1998; Sahiner, et al. 2001).
The aim of the present work is to investigate the problem of classifying mammographic masses with high accuracy, using measures of shape complexity, edge-sharpness, and texture (Rangayyan, et al. 2000; Hadjiiski, et al. 1999; Alto, et al. 2005; André, & Rangayyan, 2006; Mudigonda, et al. 2000; Mudigonda, et al. 2001; Sahiner, et al. 1998; Sahiner, et al. 2001). We propose a classifier using radial basis functions (RBF) (Haykin, 1999) and simulated annealing (SA) (Haykin, 1999), along with nonlinear and combinational optimization (Haykin, 1999; Broomhead, & Lowe, 1988). The results of the proposed approach are compared with the results obtained by André and Rangayyan (2006) and Alto et al. (2005), who used standard artificial neural networks (ANNs) and linear discriminant analysis (LDA), respectively, with the same dataset and features as in the present study.