Use of dimensionality reduction for structural mapping of hip joint osteoarthritis data

Abstract

A visualization-based, computer-oriented, classification scheme is proposed for assessing the severity of hip osteoarthritis (OA) using dimensionality reduction techniques. The introduced methodology tries to cope with the confined ability of physicians to structurally organize the entire available set of medical data into semantically similar categories and provide the capability to make visual observations among the ensemble of data using low-dimensional biplots. In this work, 18 pelvic radiographs of patients with verified unilateral hip OA are evaluated by experienced physicians and assessed into Normal, Mild and Severe following the Kellgren and Lawrence scale. Two regions of interest corresponding to radiographic hip joint spaces are determined and representative features are extracted using a typical texture analysis technique. The structural organization of all hip OA data is accomplished using distance and topology preservation-based dimensionality reduction techniques. The resulting map is a low-dimensional biplot that reflects the intrinsic organization of the ensemble of available data and which can be directly accessed by the physician. The conceivable visualization scheme can potentially reveal critical data similarities and help the operator to visually estimate their initial diagnosis. In addition, it can be used to detect putative clustering tendencies, examine the presence of data similarities and indicate the existence of possible false alarms in the initial perceptual evaluation.