Automatic pectoral muscle removal in mammograms

Abstract

The pectoral muscle is the high-intensity region in most mediolateral oblique (MLO) views of mammograms. Since it appears at the same intensity as most abnormalities it should be removed for successful classification. Removal of pectoral muscle is often a challenging task since its position, size and shape are different for different patients and it may not occur at all. In this paper, an efficient technique for the detection and removal of pectoral muscle is proposed. The algorithm is tested and proved efficient over a wide range of pectoral muscle types and datasets based on IOU and RMSE value.