Ensuring referential integrity of medical image data

• US 20090248440A1
• Filed: 04/01/2008
• Published: 10/01/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 04/01/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Siemens Healthcare GMBH (Siemens AG)
• Original Assignee: Siemens AG
• Inventors: Dorn, Karlheinz, Becker, Detlef, Michel, Armin, Hewett, Andrew John
• Granted Patent: US 9,070,095 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 705/2
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/06 Resources, workflows, human or project management; Enterprise or organisation planning; Enterprise or organisation modelling
• CPC Class Codes: G16H 30/20 for handling medical images, e.g. DICOM, HL7 or PACS

Abstract

A method, a system and a computer program product are disclosed for providing information concerning scheduled procedure steps and/or information concerning performed procedure steps within a taskflow which includes a plurality of tasks for processing medical image data. Each taskflow is associated with a taskflow specific context folder. In at least one embodiment, a publisher task is adapted to select selected data out of the medical image data. For these selected data, meta-information is updated by incorporating additional information concerning scheduled procedure steps and performed procedure steps. This is done by maintaining referential integrity between image data, scheduled procedure steps and performed procedure steps.

Claims

1. Method for providing information concerning at least one of scheduled procedure steps and performed procedure steps within a taskflow out of a plurality of different taskflows, a taskflow including a plurality of tasks for processing medical image data, and each taskflow being associated with a taskflow specific context folder for storing taskflow specific data, the method comprising:

selecting data out of the medical image data, stored in the context folder, the selected data being made available to external entities;

updating meta-information for the selected data by providing information concerning at least one of scheduled procedure steps and performed procedure steps within the taskflow; and

maintaining referential integrity between selected data, scheduled procedure steps and performed procedure steps by way of a publisher task, independent of the tasks of the taskflow.

2. Method according to claim 1, wherein the data is medical data in a DICOM format and the meta-information is a DICOM header.

3. Method according to claim 1, wherein the selecting is based on at least one of global and taskflow specific rules.

4. Method according to claim 1, wherein the updating is carried out at least one of at pre-definable timepoints within the taskflow and according to pre-definable rules.

5. Method according to claim 1, wherein the selected data is stored in a short time storage.

6. Method according to claim 1, wherein the selected data is checked at least one of before and after being stored.

7. Method according to claim 1, further comprising:

making available at least one of information concerning scheduled procedure steps and information concerning performed procedure steps to an initializer, adapted to start the taskflow.

8. Method according to claim 1, wherein separate instances of the publisher task are generated.

9. Method according to claim 1, wherein a single instance of the publisher task is used for each taskflow.

10. Method according to claim 1, wherein at least one of the selecting, updating and maintaining is carried out automatically.

11. Method according to claim 1, wherein the taskflow is controlled by a workflow engine, being a superordinate entity for the taskflow and wherein the workflow engine automatically creates the publisher task.

14. Computer program product being loadable in a memory of a computer, wherein the computer program is adapted to carry out the steps of the method according to claim 1 when executed on the computer.

15. Method according to claim 7, wherein at least one of the selecting, updating, maintaining and making is carried out automatically.

16. A computer readable medium including program segments for, when executed on a computer device, causing the computer device to implement the method of claim 1.

12. System for providing at least one of information concerning scheduled procedure steps and information concerning performed procedure steps within a taskflow out of a plurality of different taskflows, a taskflow including a plurality of tasks and a task being adapted to process medical image data, and each taskflow being associated with a taskflow specific context folder for storing taskflow specific data, the system comprising:

a selection module to select data out of the medical image data, stored in the context folder, the selected data being made available to external entities;

an updating module to update meta-information for the selected data by providing at least one of information concerning scheduled procedure steps and information concerning performed procedure steps within the taskflow; and

an integrity module to maintain referential integrity between selected data, scheduled procedure steps and performed procedure steps by way of a publisher module, the publisher module being separate from the tasks of the taskflow.

13. System according to claim 12, further comprising a workflow engine to control the tasks of the taskflow.

17. System for providing at least one of information concerning scheduled procedure steps and information concerning performed procedure steps within a taskflow out of a plurality of different taskflows, a taskflow including a plurality of tasks and a task being adapted to process medical image data, and each taskflow being associated with a taskflow specific context folder for storing taskflow specific data, the system comprising:

means for selecting data out of the medical image data, stored in the context folder, the selected data being made available to external entities;

means for updating meta-information for the selected data by providing at least one of information concerning scheduled procedure steps and information concerning performed procedure steps within the taskflow; and

means for maintaining referential integrity between selected data, scheduled procedure steps and performed procedure steps by way of a publisher module, the publisher module being separate from the tasks of the taskflow.

18. System according to claim 17, further comprising means for controlling the tasks of the taskflow.