CONTROL MODULE AND CONTROL METHOD TO DETERMINE PERSPECTIVE IN THE RENDERING OF MEDICAL IMAGE DATA SETS

• US 20140035811A1
• Filed: 08/06/2013
• Published: 02/06/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 08/06/2012
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Siemens Healthcare GMBH (Siemens AG)
• Original Assignee: Siemens AG
• Inventors: Guehring, Jens, Nufer, Stephan
• Granted Patent: US 9,208,747 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 345/156
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0482 Interaction with lists of selectable items, e.g. menus
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/147 using display panels
• CPC Class Codes: G09G 2340/12 Overlay of images, i.e. displayed pixel being the result of switching between the corresponding input pixels
• CPC Class Codes: G09G 2354/00 Aspects of interface with display user
• CPC Class Codes: G09G 2380/08 Biomedical applications
• CPC Class Codes: G09G 5/006 Details of the interface to the display terminal specific for a display terminal using a CRT G09G1/167; using a flat panel G09G3/2096; circuits for interfacing with colour displays G09G5/04
• CPC Class Codes: G16H 30/20 for handling medical images, e.g. DICOM, HL7 or PACS

Abstract

In a control method and a control unit for context-specific determination of at least one DESIRED perspective upon rendering of medical image data at a monitor, a graphical symbol is generated at a user interface dynamically and depending on an image status in order to detect a perspective control signal, and is used to control the rendering.

Claims

1. A control unit to determine perspectives upon rendering an image data set in a DESIRED perspective for presentation at a display device, comprising:

a detection unit configured to acquire the image data set and an image status associated with the image data set;

a memory in which rules are stored in order to determine a set of selectable perspectives depending on the detected image status and, when present, on a REAL perspective of an already rendered image;

a calculation unit configured to calculate the set of selectable perspectives based on the rules accessed from said memory;

a user interface;

a symbol unit configured to dynamically generate an interactive symbol for graphical representation of the calculated set of selectable perspectives, and to show the symbol on the user interface for the selection of a DESIRED perspective, and to detect at least one perspective control signal at the shown, interactive symbol to determine the DESIRED perspective; and

a rendering unit configured to render the image data set in the determined DESIRED perspective, based on the detected perspective control signal, and to make the rendered image data set available in electronic form as a data file at an output of the rendering unit.

2. A control unit as claimed in claim 1 wherein said detection unit, said calculation unit, said symbol unit and said rendering unit are configured as a graphic processor in a graphic card.

3. A control method to determine perspectives upon rendering an image data set in a DESIRED perspective for presentation at a display device comprising:

supplying the image data set and an image status associated with the image data set to a processor;

from said processor, accessing a memory in which rules are stored in order to determine a set of selectable perspectives depending on the detected image status and, when present, on a REAL perspective of an already rendered image;

in said processor, calculating the set of selectable perspectives based on the rules accessed from memory;

in said processor, dynamically generating an interactive symbol for graphical representation of the calculated set of selectable perspectives;

in said processor, showing the interactive symbol at a user interface for selection of a DESIRED perspective from the calculated set of selectable perspectives that is represented with the symbol;

in said processor, detecting a perspective control signal at the shown, interactive symbol to determine the DESIRED perspective; and

in said processor, rendering the image data set in the determined DESIRED perspective based on the detected perspective control signal, and making the rendered image data set available in electronic form as a data file at an output of said processor.

4. A control method according to claim 3, comprising controlling and executing a perspective change in an image that is already presented at a display device, and providing the rendered image data set in a REAL perspective at the display device.

5. A control method according to claim 3, comprising generating the symbol as at least one of a graphical and a text representation of the respective perspectives.

6. A control method according to claim 3, comprising showing the symbol at the user interface overlaid on an already shown image data set in the REAL perspective.

7. A control method according to claim 3, comprising entering the perspective control signal by an individual action by a user.

8. A control method as claimed in claim 7 wherein said action is selected from the group consisting of at least one mouse click and at least one text input via keyboard, and at least one touch jester at a touchscreen.

9. A control method according to claim 3, comprising detecting the image status automatically in said processor from at least one of metadata regarding the image data, data with regard to modality, type of examination, organ, finding, position and context of the image data, and automatically deriving which perspectives are meaningful from the image status data.

10. A control method according to claim 3, comprising generating the interactive, graphical symbol to include a selectable rendering mode that is taken into account in the rendering of the image data set in the DESIRED perspective.

11. A non-transitory, computer-readable data storage medium encoded with programming instructions that, when the storage medium is loaded into a computerized processing system, cause the processing system to:

receive an image data set and an image status associated with the image data set;

access a memory in which rules are stored in order to determine a set of selectable perspectives dependent on the received image status and, when present, on a REAL perspective of an already rendered image;

calculate the set of selectable perspectives based on the rules accessed from the memory;

dynamically generate an interactive symbol for graphical representation of the calculated set of selectable perspectives, and show the symbol on a user interface for selection of a DESIRED perspective, and detect at least one perspective control signal at the shown, interactive symbol at the user interface to determine the DESIRED perspective; and

render the image data set in the determined DESIRED perspective, based on the detected perspective control signal, and make the rendered image data set available in electronic form as a data file at an output of the system.