Enhancement of mammographic features by optimal adaptive neighborhood image processing.

X-ray mammography is the only breast cancer detection technique presently available with proven efficacy. Mammographic detection of early breast cancer requires optimal radiological or image processing techniques. We present an image processing approach based on adaptive neighborhood processing with a new set of contrast enhancement functions to enhance mammographic features. This procedure brings out the features in the image with little or no enhancement of the noise. We also find that adaptive neighborhoods with surrounds whose width is a constant difference from the center yield improved enhancement over adaptive neighborhoods with a constant ratio of surround to center neighborhood widths.