Quality control of elbow joint radiography using a YOLOv8-based artificial intelligence technology.

BACKGROUND

To explore an artificial intelligence (AI) technology employing YOLOv8 for quality control (QC) on elbow joint radiographs.

METHODS

From January 2022 to August 2023, 2643 consecutive elbow radiographs were collected and randomly assigned to the training, validation, and test sets in a 6:2:2 ratio. We proposed the anteroposterior (AP) and lateral (LAT) models to identify target detection boxes and key points on elbow radiographs using YOLOv8. These identifications were transformed into five quality standards: (1) AP elbow positioning coordinates (X and Y); (2) olecranon fossa positioning distance parameters (S and S); (3) key points of joint space (Y, Y, Y and Y); (4) LAT elbow positioning coordinates (X and Y); and (5) flexion angle. Models were trained and validated using 2,120 radiographs. A test set of 523 radiographs was used for assessing the agreement between AI and physician and to evaluate clinical efficiency of models.

RESULTS

The AP and LAT models demonstrated high precision, recall, and mean average precision for identifying boxes and points. AI and physicians showed high intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) in evaluating: AP coordinates X (0.987) and Y (0.991); olecranon fossa parameters S (0.964) and S (0.951); key points Y (0.998), Y (0.997), Y (0.998) and Y (0.959); LAT coordinates X (0.994) and Y (0.986); and flexion angle (0.865). Compared to manual methods, using AI, QC time was reduced by 43% for AP images and 45% for LAT images (p < 0.001).

CONCLUSION

YOLOv8-based AI technology is feasible for QC of elbow radiography with high performance.

RELEVANCE STATEMENT

This study proposed and validated a YOLOv8-based AI model for automated quality control in elbow radiography, obtaining high efficiency in clinical settings.

KEY POINTS

QC of elbow joint radiography is important for detecting diseases. Models based on YOLOv8 are proposed and perform well in image QC. Models offer objective and efficient solutions for QC in elbow joint radiographs.