DrishtiCare: a telescreening platform for XXXX powered with fundus image analysis.

@entity1 @entity227 @entity6 @entity1939 @entity989
OBJECTIVE: @entity6 is the leading cause of @entity1939 in urban populations. Early diagnosis through regular screening and timely treatment has been shown to prevent @entity227 and @entity1939 . It is very difficult to cater to this vast set of @entity6 @entity1 , primarily because of high costs in reaching out to @entity1 and a scarcity of skilled personnel. Telescreening offers a cost-effective solution to reach out to @entity1 but is still inadequate due to an insufficient number of experts who serve the @entity6 population. Developments toward fundus image analysis have shown promise in addressing the scarcity of skilled personnel for large-scale screening. This article aims at addressing the underlying issues in traditional telescreening to develop a solution that leverages the developments carried out in fundus image analysis. METHOD: We propose a novel Web-based telescreening solution (called DrishtiCare) integrating various value-added fundus image analysis components. A Web-based platform on the software as a service (SaaS) delivery model is chosen to make the service cost-effective, easy to use, and scalable. A server-based prescreening system is employed to scrutinize the fundus images of @entity1 and to refer them to the experts. An automatic quality assessment module ensures transfer of fundus images that meet grading standards. An easy-to-use interface, enabled with new visualization features, is designed for case examination by experts. RESULTS: Three local primary eye hospitals have participated and used DrishtiCare's telescreening service. A preliminary evaluation of the proposed platform is performed on a set of 119 @entity1 , of which 23% are identified with the sight-threatening @entity989 . Currently, evaluation at a larger scale is under process, and a total of 450 @entity1 have been enrolled. CONCLUSION: The proposed approach provides an innovative way of integrating automated fundus image analysis in the telescreening framework to address well-known challenges in large-scale disease screening. It offers a low-cost, effective, and easily adoptable screening solution to primary care providers.
