Patent ID: 7953261

Claim:
An image processing apparatus comprising; an image inputting unit configured to input a medical image having a plurality of color signals; a determining unit configured to determine whether a biological mucosa is sufficiently captured in the inputted medical image or not; and a controlling unit configured to control at least either displaying or storing of the medical image based on the determination result in the determining unit; an image dividing unit configured to divide the medical image into a plurality of areas; a feature value calculating unit configured to calculate one or more feature values in each of the plurality of areas of the medical image; an area classifying unit configured to identify which class of the plurality of classes each of the plurality of areas belongs to based on the feature value and classify each of the plurality of areas by the identification result; a classification determining value calculating unit configured to calculate a proportion of a group of areas classified in a predetermined class among the plurality of classes in the plurality of areas based on the classification result by the area classifying unit; and an image classifying unit configured to classify the image having the group of areas classified into the predetermined class based on the proportion calculated by the classification determining value calculating unit and a predetermined threshold relating to the proportion; wherein the determining unit determines that the medical image is an image in which a biological mucosa is not sufficiently captured if the proportion is a predetermined threshold or less, and determines that the medical image is an image in which a biological mucosa is sufficiently captured if the proportion is larger than the predetermined threshold, based on the classification result by the image classifying unit.