Point scatterer enhancement in ultrasound by wavelet coefficient shrinkage

The size, distribution and morphology of microcalcifications (MCs) in breasts can for some cases be considered an early indicator of breast cancer. MCs are small, hard calcium deposits in soft breast tissue and appear as point scatterers in an ultrasound image. However, detection of MCs in ultrasound images is challenging. Background speckle often obscure the MCs and thus highly affect the probability of detection and classification. The proposed algorithm uses a coherence-based wavelet shrinkage method to suppress speckle background in order to enhance point scatterers.