What is Medical X-Ray Images

The efficient content-based image retrieval of biomedical images is a challenging problem of growing interest in the research community. This book chapter describes a framework with two segmentation methods to analyze X-ray images of the spinal columns in order to extract vertebra regions and contours. The authors describe an application of the proposed methods which consists on an evaluation of vertebra motion induced by their movement between two or several positions. Their framework permits to extract the parameters determining vertebral mobility and its variation during flexion-extension movements. The first approach on our framework consists of a new contour vertebra detection technique using a polar signature system combined with a template matching process. This approach is based on a preliminary selection of vertebra regions. The second approach of our framework is based on automatic corner points of interest detection using the Harris corner detector.