Quantitative low-resolution analysis of colon mucosa.

A general concept is presented for the analysis of histopathologically adenomatous structures at low levels of magnification. The algorithm is based upon structures of glands, not upon structures of single cells. Low microscopic magnification was used to assess the following parameters in colon mucosa: minimum diameter of glands, minimum distance to neighboring glands, number of neighbors, area of glands and circumference of glands. Twenty different specimens were analyzed for each of the following diagnostic groups: healthy tissue, tubulovillous adenoma and moderately to highly differentiated adenocarcinoma of the colon. Statistically significant differences (p less than or equal to 0.01) were obtained for each measured parameter for each group. The data indicate that low-resolution morphometry can be used successfully for the automatic separation of healthy, benign and malignant growths in adenomatous tissue.