A method of extracting a region of interest from a tongue image and a health monitoring method and apparatus using the tongue image are provided. The health monitoring method includes constructing a database in which a tongue image obtained from a person, a template image set for the person, and a result of determining a health state of the person with respect to at least one characteristic factor are linked to one another extracting a region of interest from a tongue image, which is acquired from a person whose health state is to be determined, using template matching detecting at least one characteristic factor from the extracted region of interest and determining the persons health state based on a change in a tongue state, which is detected from a comparison between the detected characteristic factor and a characteristic factor searched from the database with respect to the region of interest in different health states.
