iScout: an intelligent scout for navigating large image sets

Abstract

A new intelligent software tool for PACS systems called 'iScout' has been developed that constructs and displays an overview of large series or studies before downloading the set of images to a PACS workstation. The overview consists of two orthogonal cross-section images that allow the user to select and download a subset of images, avoiding long delays that can occur while downloading hundreds or even thousands of images. The iScout also provides a navigational tool, allowing the user to click on anatomical regions and view the relevant slices, while displaying the anatomical location of the image currently being displayed by the PACS workstation software. The construction of an iScout can be done on either a workstation or a server with only minimal overhead that does not significantly affect the speed of loading. A working iScout tool has been integrated with multi-modality PACS workstation software (McKesson Medical Imaging Solutions), and it was found that the iScout can be generated on the workstation with a maximum added overhead of only 3.4 seconds while downloading a study containing 433 512x512 CT images. The iScout is flexible and can generate scouts for virtually all types of CT and MR images, as well as 3D Ultrasound.

iScout: An Intelligent Scout for Accessing and Navigating Large Image Sets in a PACS

“…Previous results in ref. 8 show that priority downloading significantly reduces the time to access an image of interest while downloading a large image series. The premise in ref.…”

“…The premise in ref. 8 is that the user is interested in a single image in the study and workflow depends on the time for that image to download. A more reasonable model considers the situation where multiple images are selected for priority downloading rather than a single image.…”