Distortion reduction for fast soft straightening of the colon.

RATIONALE AND
OBJECTIVES: The purpose of this study was to suppress the geometric distortion associated with soft straightening of the colon by moderately adjusting curved cross sections, which is equivalent to appropriately modifying the underlying electrical field.
MATERIALS AND METHODS: A computational mechanism to reduce the geometric distortion associated with soft straightening was developed. Because the cause of distortion is uneven sampling of the colon wall with curved cross sections, the curved cross sections formed according to a numerically simulated electrical field were redistributed in the distortion reduction process. This mechanism can be directly incorporated into a previously published fast soft-straightening algorithm. Simulations were performed to evaluate the effectiveness of the mechanism, and a phantom colon with digitally implanted, spherical polyps was straightened and rendered to visually display the efficacy of the mechanism.
RESULTS: The distortion reduction mechanism was advantageous regarding shape preservation of polyps and alleviated distortion substantially. The mechanism occupied only a small portion of the total processing time.
CONCLUSION: The distortion reduction mechanism can effectively reduce the geometric distortion associated with soft straightening at little computational cost and has potential for use with computed tomographic colonography.