Digital image enhancement for the visually-impaired: simulations and results

The authors evaluate whether patients demonstrate improved face recognition when viewing enhanced images. Difficulty with face recognition is a frequent, early complaint of many patients with macular disease. Faces can be recognized when low-pass filtered to a large degree or high-pass filtered. To evaluate actual face recognition rather than the ability to discriminate among test faces, the authors tested the patient´s ability to recognize celebrities, which is more robust than the recognition of unfamiliar faces. It is shown that all patients demonstrated better face recognition with the enhanced images than with the original, untouched images. Analysis of the difference between the two areas under the receiver operating curves indicated a statistically significant increase in recognition for 8 out of 17 patients. Patients reported that the enhanced images were significantly clearer, sharper, and easier to see