Glaucoma Expert-Level Detection of Angle Closure in Goniophotographs With Convolutional Neural Networks: The Chinese American Eye Study

PURPOSE

To compare the performance of a novel convolutional neural network (CNN) classifier and human graders in detecting angle closure in EyeCam (Clarity Medical Systems, Pleasanton, California, USA) goniophotographs.

DESIGN

Retrospective cross-sectional study.

METHODS

Subjects from the Chinese American Eye Study underwent EyeCam goniophotography in 4 angle quadrants. A CNN classifier based on the ResNet-50 architecture was trained to detect angle closure, defined as inability to visualize the pigmented trabecular meshwork, using reference labels by a single experienced glaucoma specialist. The performance of the CNN classifier was assessed using an independent test dataset and reference labels by the single glaucoma specialist or a panel of 3 glaucoma specialists. This performance was compared to that of 9 human graders with a range of clinical experience. Outcome measures included area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUC) metrics and Cohen kappa coefficients in the binary classification of open or closed angle.

RESULTS

The CNN classifier was developed using 29,706 open and 2,929 closed angle images. The independent test dataset was composed of 600 open and 400 closed angle images. The CNN classifier achieved excellent performance based on single-grader (AUC = 0.969) and consensus (AUC = 0.952) labels. The agreement between the CNN classifier and consensus labels (κ = 0.746) surpassed that of all non-reference human graders (κ = 0.578-0.702). Human grader agreement with consensus labels improved with clinical experience (P = 0.03).

CONCLUSION

A CNN classifier can effectively detect angle closure in goniophotographs with performance comparable to that of an experienced glaucoma specialist. This provides an automated method to support remote detection of patients at risk for primary angle closure glaucoma.