Quantifying the color changes in bruised skin using a color-calibrated imaging system

Abstract

The color of human skin can indirectly reflect the course of certain diseases, especially trauma or chronic diseases. Traditionally, doctors inspect and notice the abnormalities in the patient's skin color and then perform further examinations, such as blood or urine tests. The color of the skin can only be seen as a reference through the naked eye. To quantify it depends on a measurement system with precise lighting control and color correction procedures. In this study, an imaging system with color correction was developed to quantify the color of the skin. Through the composition of high color rendering lighting, dark room module, camera and polynomial regression algorithm to achieve the standard color difference (ΔE*) of less than 3. Measurements of artificial bruise and novel analytical methods were performed and developed to verify its performance. The results show that the developed system has the advantages of portability, high uniformity and high color accuracy. This research has successfully developed a novel inspection method for medical diagnostics, forensic science, and related applications.