Partial Decoder Attention Network with Contour-weighted Loss Function for Data-Imbalance Medical Image Segmentation

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Main Authors: Huang, Zhengyong, Jiang, Ning, Sun, Xingwen, Zhang, Lihua, Chen, Peng, Domke, Jens, Sui, Yao
Format: Preprint
Published: 2026
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author Huang, Zhengyong
Jiang, Ning
Sun, Xingwen
Zhang, Lihua
Chen, Peng
Domke, Jens
Sui, Yao
author_facet Huang, Zhengyong
Jiang, Ning
Sun, Xingwen
Zhang, Lihua
Chen, Peng
Domke, Jens
Sui, Yao
contents Image segmentation is pivotal in medical image analysis, facilitating clinical diagnosis, treatment planning, and disease evaluation. Deep learning has significantly advanced automatic segmentation methodologies by providing superior modeling capability for complex structures and fine-grained anatomical regions. However, medical images often suffer from data imbalance issues, such as large volume disparities among organs or tissues, and uneven sample distributions across different anatomical structures. This imbalance tends to bias the model toward larger organs or more frequently represented structures, while overlooking smaller or less represented structures, thereby affecting the segmentation accuracy and robustness. To address these challenges, we proposed a novel contour-weighted segmentation approach, which improves the model's capability to represent small and underrepresented structures. We developed PDANet, a lightweight and efficient segmentation network based on a partial decoder mechanism. We evaluated our method using three prominent public datasets. The experimental results show that our methodology excelled in three distinct tasks: segmenting multiple abdominal organs, brain tumors, and pelvic bone fragments with injuries. It consistently outperformed nine state-of-the-art methods. Moreover, the proposed contour-weighted strategy improved segmentation for other comparison methods across the three datasets, yielding average enhancements in Dice scores of 2.32%, 1.67%, and 3.60%, respectively. These results demonstrate that our contour-weighted segmentation method surpassed current leading approaches in both accuracy and robustness. As a model-independent strategy, it can seamlessly fit various segmentation frameworks, enhancing their performance. This flexibility highlighted its practical importance and potential for broad use in medical image analysis.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2601_14338
institution arXiv
publishDate 2026
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Partial Decoder Attention Network with Contour-weighted Loss Function for Data-Imbalance Medical Image Segmentation
Huang, Zhengyong
Jiang, Ning
Sun, Xingwen
Zhang, Lihua
Chen, Peng
Domke, Jens
Sui, Yao
Image and Video Processing
Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition
Image segmentation is pivotal in medical image analysis, facilitating clinical diagnosis, treatment planning, and disease evaluation. Deep learning has significantly advanced automatic segmentation methodologies by providing superior modeling capability for complex structures and fine-grained anatomical regions. However, medical images often suffer from data imbalance issues, such as large volume disparities among organs or tissues, and uneven sample distributions across different anatomical structures. This imbalance tends to bias the model toward larger organs or more frequently represented structures, while overlooking smaller or less represented structures, thereby affecting the segmentation accuracy and robustness. To address these challenges, we proposed a novel contour-weighted segmentation approach, which improves the model's capability to represent small and underrepresented structures. We developed PDANet, a lightweight and efficient segmentation network based on a partial decoder mechanism. We evaluated our method using three prominent public datasets. The experimental results show that our methodology excelled in three distinct tasks: segmenting multiple abdominal organs, brain tumors, and pelvic bone fragments with injuries. It consistently outperformed nine state-of-the-art methods. Moreover, the proposed contour-weighted strategy improved segmentation for other comparison methods across the three datasets, yielding average enhancements in Dice scores of 2.32%, 1.67%, and 3.60%, respectively. These results demonstrate that our contour-weighted segmentation method surpassed current leading approaches in both accuracy and robustness. As a model-independent strategy, it can seamlessly fit various segmentation frameworks, enhancing their performance. This flexibility highlighted its practical importance and potential for broad use in medical image analysis.
title Partial Decoder Attention Network with Contour-weighted Loss Function for Data-Imbalance Medical Image Segmentation
topic Image and Video Processing
Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2601.14338