Interactive, knowledge-guided visualization of 3D medical imagery

One of the most important and difficult decision-making tasks is that of in terpreting three-dimensional (3D) medical imagery. This information-intensi ve task typically requires expediency, accuracy and reliability in both the Visual presentation as well as in the interpretation of complex informatio n. We present an approach that facilitates this task by using domain knowle dge to assist in the interpretation and visualization of 3D cardiac imagery . The objective is to provide the clinician with a more efficient, reliable , comprehensive, and clinically useful manner with which to accurately inte rpret and display large amounts of complex information. These objectives ar e met by capturing and representing the Visual reasoning process in a compu tational model, and providing the user with an intuitive graphical and text ual representation of the data, as well as explanations, justifications, an d interactive data visualizations. The approach is illustrated with cardiov ascular 3D SPECT tomographic perfusion imagery, a technique aimed at diagno sing heart disease. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.