The hippocampus has a key role in a number of neurodegenerative diseases, such as Alzheimer’s Disease.
Here we present a novel method for the automated segmentation of the hippocampus from structural
magnetic resonance images (MRI), based on a combination of multiple classifiers. The method is validated
on a cohort of 50 T1 MRI scans, comprehending healthy control, mild cognitive impairment, and
Alzheimer’s Disease subjects. The preliminary release of the EADC-ADNI Harmonized Protocol training
labels is used as gold standard. The fully automated pipeline consists of a registration using an affine
transformation, the extraction of a local bounding box, and the classification of each voxel in two classes
(background and hippocampus). The classification is performed slice-by-slice along each of the three orthogonal
directions of the 3D-MRI using a Random Forest (RF) classifier, followed by a fusion of the three
full segmentations. Dice coefficients obtained by multiple RF (0.87 ± 0.03) are larger than those obtained
by a single monolithic RF applied to the entire bounding box, and are comparable to state-ofthe-art.
A test on an external cohort of 50 T1 MRI scans shows that the presented method is robust and
reliable. Additionally, a comparison of local changes in the morphology of the hippocampi between the
three subject groups is performed. Our work showed that a multiple classification approach can be implemented
for the segmentation for the measurement of volume and shape changes of the hippocampus
with diagnostic purposes.