Automatic image quality assessment in digital pathology: from idea to implementation

At this time, the quality of a Whole Slide Image (WSI) is verified a posteriori by a technician or a pathologist. A WSI of insufficient quality needs to be scanned again. High-speed automatic quality assessment tools for WSI will therefore greatly improve laboratory workflow. We describe here a fast method to automatically assess WSI quality, with different tests such as blurriness, contrast, brightness and color, and to accept or discard them at the time of acquisition in less than a minute. Parameters are weighted by pertinence and a global score indicates whether the WSI is suitable for further use. This fast method, designed at first to improve laboratory workflow, is currently being implemented in a network of 27 French hospitals and public-private health institutions in the Paris region. It may also be used as a calibration and quality control tool for WSI acquisition systems.