A Novel Visualization of OCTA Coronal Views of Macula Vasculature

 The results of the experiemental work presented in the journal paper with the title : A Novel Visualization of Coronal Views for Macula Vasculature in Optical Coherence Tomography Angiography (OCTA), which has the following abstratct A novel computer-based method is proposed to address the current challenges of optical coherence tomography angiography (OCTA): (1) the need for considering the natural curvature of the eye; (2) the need for generating angiograms for individual choroid layers; and (3) the need for enhancing the visibility of blood flow below the outer retina region. A digital Image Processing (DIP) algorithm was designed and implemented on 20 subjects that were obtained from OCTA500 international dataset. The subjects were acquired at two OCTA fields of view (FOV) including the right and left eyes (OD and OS) that covered the five common macula disorders. The method includes image preprocessing, reconstruction, and enhancement stages. The sequential enface OCTA images at nearly 5µm macula depths were generated. The tubular morphology of the macula vasculature was enhanced for all macula depths. The resulting new ophthalmic views enable: (1) avoiding the superimposition of macula vasculature into a single projection map; (2) enhancing the OCTA perceptibility of blood vessels; and (3) capturing the macula’s 3D oval-shaped. The proposed method was successful in displaying macula vasculature for every 5µm macula depths, which was previously difficult to decipher. Thus, tracking the 3D propagation of the blood vessel network at all macula depths becomes possible. The method is independent of OCTA both FOVs, type of macula disorder, and the OD or OS eye. The enhancement stage remarkably improved the visibility of blood vessels at all macula depths, including the deep choroid layers. The method could be beneficial to the OCTA clinics.