A SMOTE-Enhanced Hybrid VGG16–ResNet-50 Model for Automated Diabetic Retinopathy Detection
Keywords:
Diabetic Retinopathy, Deep Learning, Hybrid Model, Fundus Image Classification, Quantization-aware TrainingAbstract
Diabetic Retinopathy (DR) occupies the top space among the preventable causes of vision loss across the globe with people who are diabetic presenting a higher number of victims. It suggests a hybrid deep learning network that consists of the VGG16 and ResNet-50 architecture to improve classification of the severity of DR based on the retinal fundus image. To fit the data model, a balanced and preprocessed dataset was used by applying data augmentation and Synthetic Minority Over-sampling Technique (SMOTE). Training was performed on input images which were normalized to 512 x 512 pixels and carried out over 25 epochs with a batch size of 32. The suggested model attained mean accuracy, precise, recall at 86%, 85%, 84% and F1- score at 85% respectively as compared to benchmark meaning that the model is capable of robust classification. Quantization-aware training was also used to maximize the computational efficiency of the model where the model now takes 95 milliseconds on average to process a single image, suitable to be deployed in a near real-time fashion (low resources). The hybrid model shows scalability with promise of inclusion in automated DR screening systems and will, therefore, provide an early solution to accurate diagnosis despite a few misclassifications that occurred due to the visual similarities between the DR stages.
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Copyright (c) 2025 Muhammad Faris, Shahzaib Khalid, Muhammad Dilawar Khan, Mir Farooq Ali, Muhammad Mansoor Mughal , Tariq Javid

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