Realization of Balanced Contrast Limited Adaptive Histogram Equalization (B-CLAHE) for Adaptive Dynamic Range Compression of real time medical images

Abstract

Medical devices these days come with very high dynamic range outputs to diagnose various diseases. This high dynamic range images should not only be compressed but also the contrast of the image must be enhanced to preserve the details on common display devices. Such algorithms are usually run off-line on images due to the high cost of implementation. This paper looks into the implementation of Balanced Contrast Limited Adaptive Histogram Equalization (BCLAHE) for Adaptive Dynamic Range Compression (ADRC) of real time medical images. This method is specifically targeted at situations where continuous exposure is required. For example in X-ray, CT-Scan or IR imaging, the real time video of the target is observed until the region of interest (ROI) is identified. The proposed implementation scheme is tested and has shown good results in terms of latency and perceptibility of minute details.