Multispectral venous images analysis for optimum illumination selection

Intravenous (IV) catheterization is the most important phase in medical practices of daily life. It is hard to localize veins in patients who have deep veins, minor age or dark skin; hence multiple attempts become indispensable for proper catheterization in such cases. Near Infrared (NIR) Imaging allow to visualize the veins underneath the skin of persons having non-visibility of veins problem. This paper reports the pre-selection of illuminants that ensure best veins/tissues contrast for patients having different skin tone. The sample subjects have been divided in four different classes based on the Luminance value of their skin tone in order to extract the best illuminant wavelengths range for each class. A multispectral approach has been used which provides the flexibility of wavelength range from visible to NIR (380 to 1040nm). The veins/tissue reflectance contrast obtained helps in determining the best wavelengths range where the contrast is maximum for each of the four classes. Using these results, we are planning to build a prototype system which can automatically select the illuminants based on different physiological characteristics of a subject.