Computerized detection of peripapillary chorioretinal atrophy by texture analysis

Presence of peripapillary chorioretinal atrophy (PPA) is considered one of the risk factors for glaucoma. It can be identified as bright regions in retinal fundus images, and therefore, incorrectly included as the part of the optic disc regions in the automated disc detection scheme. For potential risk assessment and use in improving optic disc segmentation, a computerized detection of PPA was investigated. By using texture analysis, the sensitivity for detecting the moderate to severe PPA regions in the test dataset was 73% with the specificity of 95%. The proposed method may be useful for identifying the cases with the PPA in retinal fundus images.