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. 2017 Apr 10:5:31.
doi: 10.3389/fpubh.2017.00031. eCollection 2017.

3-Dimensional Facial Analysis-Facing Precision Public Health

Gareth Baynam  1   2   3   4   5   6   7 , Alicia Bauskis  3 , Nicholas Pachter  1   4   8 , Lyn Schofield  1   9 , Hedwig Verhoef  10 , Richard L Palmer  11 , Stefanie Kung  11 , Petra Helmholz  11 , Michael Ridout  11 , Caroline E Walker  3 , Anne Hawkins  1 , Jack Goldblatt  1   4 , Tarun S Weeramanthri  12 , Hugh J S Dawkins  3   8   9   13 , Caron M Molster  3
Affiliations

3-Dimensional Facial Analysis-Facing Precision Public Health

Gareth Baynam et al. Front Public Health. .

Abstract

Precision public health is a new field driven by technological advances that enable more precise descriptions and analyses of individuals and population groups, with a view to improving the overall health of populations. This promises to lead to more precise clinical and public health practices, across the continuum of prevention, screening, diagnosis, and treatment. A phenotype is the set of observable characteristics of an individual resulting from the interaction of a genotype with the environment. Precision (deep) phenotyping applies innovative technologies to exhaustively and more precisely examine the discrete components of a phenotype and goes beyond the information usually included in medical charts. This form of phenotyping is a critical component of more precise diagnostic capability and 3-dimensional facial analysis (3DFA) is a key technological enabler in this domain. In this paper, we examine the potential of 3DFA as a public health tool, by viewing it against the 10 essential public health services of the "public health wheel," developed by the US Centers for Disease Control. This provides an illustrative framework to gage current and emergent applications of genomic technologies for implementing precision public health.

Keywords: 3D facial scan; developmental disabilities; genomics and genetics; public health; rare diseases; spatial information.

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Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Some functionality of 3DFA. The purple line around the facial periphery demonstrates a cropping and facial segmentation tool. White dots are automated land marking. The vertical purple line demonstrates an application of the measuring tool, in this case showing a 17.1 mm philtral length.
Figure 2
Figure 2
The tool has modular analysis components. This figure demonstrates one such module, curvature analysis, which is demonstrated in a yellow-blue color scale.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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