I3DermoscopyApp: Hacking Melanoma thanks to IoT technologies

Abstract

The paper introduces I3DermoscopyApp, a new declination of the Internet of Things (IoT) paradigm, designed to allow the early detection of melanoma. Even though artificial intelligence programs cannot outperform the diagnostic accuracy of expert dermatologists yet, they reveal to be very useful in providing second opinions to physicians with short clinical experience, thus improving significantly their diagnostic performance. \ \ Following this trend, an original integration of mobile app technology and well-known image processing algorithms allows the automatic analysis of pigmented skin lesions to help physicians apply a diagnostic method (Seven Point Check List) based on dermoscopy. The web-based platform makes the physician able to: i) store digital images captured by smartphones featured with a dermatoscope; ii) measure morphological and chromatic parameters of the skin lesion; iii) make a diagnostic decision according to the Seven Point Checklist method. \ \ A detailed description of the adopted techniques, together with the first validation results are reported.