Coeliac disease (CD), also known as gluten-sensitive enteropathy, is a chronic disorder with characteristic small intestinal mucosal changes associated with nutrient malabsorption. To date, CD is still diagnosed using histology. The treatment of CD is to follow a gluten-free diet (GFD). The detection of mucosal healing in treated CD patients is important because it can determine the possibility of developing long-term manifestations of CD, such as intestinal lymphoma. According to current

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... ines, duodenal biopsy is the most accurate method available for detection of mucosal healing. However, there are difficulties in early detection of healing because it may take up to three years for the biopsy to show healing. Confocal laser endomicroscopy (CLE) is a novel endoscopic method that permits on-site microscopy of the gastrointestinal mucosa. It improves the accuracy of targeted biopsies and enhances the diagnostic outcome in CD, allowing high-resolution in vivo histological analysis. Although computer-aided diagnosis (CAD) has been studied in different medical imaging techniques including computed tomography (CT), magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and histology slides, its role has not yet been established for CLE images. Aims and methods The main goal of our first study was to design computer-based image-processing (computer-assisted-design [CAD]) techniques for use in the diagnosis of different stages of CD during endoscopy. The aim of this work was to design algorithms that could be implemented by computer software developers who need meticulous step-by-step procedures. My main contribution was to qualitatively define the characteristics of CAD images: this approach differed to previous studies which had mostly used quantitative descriptions in the diagnosis of CD in its different stages. This work is important as quantitative descriptions are non-subjective and can be used by non-experts such as computer software developers, whereas qualitative descriptions are subjective and can only be used by expert medica [...]