Edge detection has beneficial applications in the fields such as machine vision, pattern recognition and biomedical imaging etc. Edge detection highlights high frequency components in the image. Edge detection is a challenging task. It becomes more arduous when it comes to noisy images. This study focuses on fuzzy logic based edge detection in smooth and noisy clinical images. The proposed method (in noisy images) employs a 3 × 3 mask guided by fuzzy rule set. Moreover, in case of smooth clinical images, an extra mask of contrast adjustment is integrated with edge detection mask to intensify the smooth images. The developed method was tested on noise-free, smooth and noisy images. The results were compared with other established edge detection techniques like Sobel, Prewitt, Laplacian of Gaussian (LOG), Roberts and Canny. When the developed edge detection technique was applied to a smooth clinical image of size 270 × 290 pixels having 24 dB 'salt and pepper' noise, it detected very few (22) false edge pixels, compared to Sobel (1931), Prewitt (2741), LOG (3102), Roberts (1451) and Canny (1045) false edge pixels. Therefore it is evident that the developed method offers improved solution to the edge detection problem in smooth and noisy clinical images.