Questions on the DICOM Standard - Assignment Example

Questions on the DICOM Standard A) Reasons of DICOM Standard Establishment Medical volume data are acquired by a variety of imaging devices from different manufacturers and are displayed at very different output devices. These Medical image data are physically stored together with the information that is essential for the interpretation of the images. It is crucial that these data can be exchanged flexibly and displayed at every appropriate device. Equally essential is that the appearance of the image data on the output devices is equivalent. The purpose of the DICOM standards is to facilitate this. This information is highly standardized as a result of dedicated and long term standardization activities. One of such standardization activities is the DICOM standard. This standard is an important step in unifying the image formats and the interoperability of image producing systems with digital archives and medical workstations (Fleck, 1995, pg. 89). That is to say, the presence of this standard allows for flexibility and convertibility of medical data from different devices. The DICOM standard is the industry standard for transferral of radiological images and other medical information between computers and medical devices. This standard enables digital communication between diagnostic and therapeutic equipments and systems from various manufacturers (Preim and Bartz, 2007, pg. 65). For example, the presence of this standard has necessitated most manufacturers of CT and MRI scanners to be accredited as being DICOM conformed. This means that their output meets the specifications of the DICOM standards which make them easily convertible from one format to the other. This allows for a means of automatically and transparently communicates between compliant equipment without loss of information (Kagadis and Langer, 2011, pg. 60). B) Main Functions of DICOM; The Digital Imaging and Communications in Medicine (DICOM) standard is the industry standard for transferral of digital radiology images and other medical information between computers (Pianykh, 2011, pg. 19). The DICOM standard allows digital information exchange between medical imaging equipment and systems from different manufacturers. The connectivity that DICOM provides is important for cost effectiveness in healthcare and permits users to supply radiology services within facilities as well as for long distant. DICOM is the current industry standard for the communication of medical images and textual data. It is a consistent extension of ACR/NEMA 2.0 and contains network-wide services and standardized data format which allows for easy share and conversion of medical data across different file formats. The main function of DICOM was to facilitate the network transfer of medical images from one device to another regardless of device’s manufacturers (Soyer, Binder and Smith, 2012, pg. 141). DICOM facilitates the exchanging of digital images from diagnostic imaging modalities by use of the standard network connection and protocols of the computer industry. It specifies the structure of the image formats and descriptive parameters for images or several image series and commands for data exchange (Hertrich, 2005, pg. 289). However, the DICOM standard is limited to medical imaging systems such as diagnostic X-ray procedures, digitised X-ray images, fluoroscopy, computed tomography, nuclear medicine, ultrasound, magnetic resonance imaging as well as image-viewing and processing workstations, HIS/RIS connections and network-capable hardcopy systems such as laser printers. The main DICOM functions are to transmit and store medical images, to enable searching and retrival, to facilitate printing of hard copy, o support workflow management and to ensure quality and consistency of image presentation (Lee and Niederer, 2010, pg. 145). DICOM also has the benefit of having the abiliy to connect a number of different vendor medical imaging modalities to a Picture Archive And Communication System (PACS). This results to another major function and benefit of DICOM, that is, once the information objects needed for a new imaging techniques are developed, the existing DICOM services may be used with them. Finally, DICOM has been the corner stone in the ability to intergrate emaging functionality ino the healthcare entreprise (Siegel and Kolodner, 2001, pg. 323). Because of its openess, it allows the integration of sytem components from commercial and non commercail sources to work together to provide functional cost-effective solutions. This results in quicker deployment of digital imaging in the field and significant cost savings. C) Recent Functions of DICOM (e.g. its development over the past 5 years) Despite having undergone frequent revisions, the standard has never truly been revolutionalised. It has continually evolved, adjusting itself to current practices, yet preserving many original historical features. DICOM 3.0 has never been replaced by DICOM 4.0. Instead, the same 3.0 standard is reviewed annually by the designated DICOM working groups, publishing the updated DICOM 3.0 versions and new supplements. With the use of DICOM units, it is more important to keep new DICOM devices backwards compliant with the previous models than chasing the most recent DICOM features. For this reason DICOM manufacturers do not get excited about the most recent DICOM editions. Even most of the currently produced DICOM units have the mid-1990s set of functions (Pianykh, 2011, pg. 24). However, DICOM has changed in its functionalities since its creation. One such change is in the means of importing DICOM files into the local db. The Import button has been introduced and is now being used for bpm/jpg to DICOM import. The natural process of DICOM devices manufacturing, selling , upgrading and using spans many years, modalities are expensive and hospitals administration are typically conservative and budget conscious. This creates an environment in which drastic updates are not really welcome and compatibility with older equipments and consequently older DICOM becomes a must (Pianykh, 2011, pg. 20). This has resulted in stagnation in the functions which have been introduced into newer versions or upgrades of DICOM 3.0. Nevertheless, there has been one major improvement in the functions of DICOM. This is its ability to support 3D echocardiographic data (Badano, Lang and Zamorano, 2011, pg. 22). The supplement currently includes: storage of volumetric tissue and Doppler data, definition of multi-plane, rendering and slice views, definition of rotation, translation, pan of view planes, 3D segmentation and crop, handling of stacked ECG waveforms and blending of the different data types. This eventually will make it possible to review 3D ultrasound data on third-party DICOM viewers. D) Future Development Trend of DICOM Since its beginning as the ACR-NEMA standard, the DICOM standard has grown both in extent and influence. It is ubiquitous in radiation and is rapidly becoming so in other specialities that use imaging. The methods used by the DICOM Standards Committee to expand, refine and when necessary correct the standards have resulted in its rapid building and maintenance. Both the standards structure and its development methods serve as a model for other no medical imaging standards. DICOM is moving steadily into the future as the standard of choice for DIMS design. The merging of DICOM and HL-7 models and data dictionaries will make possible DICOM to HL-7 gateways and eventually integrated DICOM/HL-7 radiology information networks. However this will necessitate several steps before it is achieved. These steps include, the widespread availability of DICOM compatible DIMS network, which will result to single-vendor networks linking modalities, archives, image review workstations and image printers into a comprehensive network. HL-7 interfaces will allow access to RIS systems that are operated independently of DIMS networks and DICOM storage Class SCP capability will allow most modalities to send images into the DIMS archive and or plan to DIMS workstation. DICOM compatibility will be make possible multivendor image managements in which the basic network components are produced by a single vendor and modalities and printers from multiple vendors may be attached. Ultimately RIS systems will become DICOM-compatible components of DIMS networks, with HL-7 interfaces to other components of the overall Healthcare Organization Information System. DICOM workstation application functionality will migrate to clinical information workstations. At this point those systems that need to manage clinical imaging studies or reports that incorporated clinical images will support DICOM functionality as part of their basic suite of capabilities. According to Siegel and Kolodner(2001, pg. 321),beyond the integration of DIMS into HIS networksm additional funcionality and service to support it will continue to be defined. They add on, as the overall HIS definition evolves, DICOM too will evolve o keep pace. Cited Works Badano, Luigi, Roberto M Lang and José Luis Zamorano. Textbook of Real-Time Three Dimensional Echocardiography. New York: Springer, 2011. Fleck, Eckart. Open Systems in Medicine. New York: IOS Press, 1995. Hertrich, Peter H. Practical Radiography: Principles And Applications. illustrated. Berlin: Wiley-VCH, 2005. Kagadis, George C and Steve G Langer. Informatics in Medical Imaging: Imaging in Medical Diagnosis and Therapy. illustrated. Imaging in Medical Diagnosis and Therapy: CRC Press, 2011. Lee, Clive T and Peter Niederer. Basic Engineering for Medics and Biologists: An ESEM Primer. Virginia: IOS Press, 2010. Pianykh, Oleg S. Digital Imaging and Communications in Medicine (DICOM): A Practical Introduction and Survival Guide. 2, illustrated. New York: Springer, 2011. Preim, Bernhard and Dirk Bartz. Visualization in Medicine: Theory, Algorithms, and Applications. illustrated. Massachusetts : Morgan Kaufmann Publishers, 2007. Siegel, Eliot L and Robert M Kolodner. Filmless Radiology. 3, reprint, illustrated. New York: Springer, 2001. Soyer, Hans Peter, et al. Telemedicine in Dermatology. illustrated. New York: Springer, 2012. Read More