Patent Document ID: 7992999
Application ID: 12427184
Patent Status: 1

Claim One:
1. A method of assessing status of a portion of a retina, which portion contains the optic disc, wherein said optic disc comprises the disc cupping, said method comprising the steps of: (A) obtaining at least one enface image generated from a plurality of three-dimensional optical coherence tomographic images of said portion; (B) generating a weighted edge map to delineate the margin of the optic disc in said enface image; (C) in each image of said plurality, identifying spatial coordinates for the internal limiting membrane and the retinal pigment epithelium layer in the optic disc; then (D) generating at least one three-dimensional surface image of the optic disc from said enface image, wherein depth in said image corresponds to said spatial coordinates of the internal limiting membrane; (E) obtaining at least one of (i) reference points, (ii) a reference line, and (iii) a reference plane with respect to at least one of (1) the retinal pigment epithelium layer and (2) said margin of the optic disc from each image of said plurality or said three-dimensional surface image; then (F) using said reference line or reference plane to delineate the margin of the disc cupping in said surface image; then (G) determining shape information of said portion from said three-dimensional surface image; and, from said shape information, (H) generating at least one three-dimensional point distribution model to classify said portion with respect to predetermined values reflecting retinal status.