Cloud-Based Radiology Viewer for Collaborative DICOM Annotation
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Solution Overview
Problem
Current medical imaging applications lack effective communication and collaboration tools, particularly for radiology images, as they fail to provide precise sharing of diagnostic information and facilitate timely, feature-specific feedback across platforms and geographical areas, leading to inefficiencies in urgent situations.
Innovation Solution
A cloud-based medical image viewer system that allows users to create, store, and share comments and annotations within DICOM image files, enabling collaboration through workspaces that include comments, annotations, and visual analytics, with features like comment threading, editing, and workspace locking to manage concurrent access.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Productivity
If cloud-based commenting and workspace sharing features are added to medical imaging applications, then communication and collaboration efficiency is improved, but device complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent introduces a cloud-based server as an intermediary to host the commenting and workspace sharing infrastructure. This allows the complex collaboration features to be delivered without increasing the complexity of individual client applications, as the server handles the sophisticated backend logic for comment threading, workspace management, and concurrent access control.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent creates a universal commenting system that can be applied across multiple medical imaging applications and platforms. The workspace sharing functionality serves multiple purposes including collaboration, communication, and knowledge sharing, allowing a single feature set to address various collaboration needs without proportionally increasing complexity.
2Measurement precision
If precise diagnostic information sharing is enabled through comments and annotations, then diagnostic accuracy is improved, but information security risks increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements role-based access control where different user roles (radiologists, referring physicians, patients) have different levels of access to comments and workspace content. This allows precise diagnostic information to be shared with appropriate personnel while restricting access for others, thereby maintaining security while enabling precise communication within authorized groups.
Solution Approach 2:
The cloud-based server acts as a secure intermediary that manages authentication, authorization, and encrypted transmission of diagnostic information. This allows precise diagnostic data to be shared accurately while the server's security infrastructure protects against unauthorized access and information breaches.
3Adaptability or versatility
If multiple users can concurrently access and edit workspaces, then collaboration capability is improved, but system reliability decreases due to potential conflicts
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements real-time feedback mechanisms including automatic save notifications, conflict detection alerts, and synchronization status indicators. When multiple users are editing the same workspace, the system provides feedback about potential conflicts and allows users to resolve them, maintaining data consistency while enabling concurrent collaboration.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent uses workspace locking mechanisms that allow one user to lock a workspace for editing while others can view but not modify. This preliminary action of granting exclusive edit rights prevents conflicts before they occur, ensuring data reliability while still allowing collaborative viewing and asynchronous contribution.
Data Source
AI summary
This disclosure relates to a medical image viewer for incorporating multi-user collaboration features, such as in-image commenting and workspace sharing. An example method includes receiving a comment location including image coordinates and comment information associated with the comment from a user device. The comment information includes a text body, identify identity information related to the user, and a comment creation date. The example method further includes determining world coordinates based on the image coordinates, and storing the world coordinates and the comment information as a subset of header attributes of the DICOM image file.