JPH1021370A - Medical image managing device and its method - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To store medical images without deteriorating its quality but with a small storage capacity by setting a class consisting of plural similar medical images to be a storing processing unit, storing only one reference image among them as it is and storing the other images as difference information between the images and the reference image. SOLUTION: An image processing system consists of plural diagnostic image pickup devices, a multi-formatter, a printer, a filing system and a disk. Then each image applied filing preparing processing is stored in a prescribed storage medium such as the disk by the filing system. Then this system sets a class consisting of plural similar medical images to be a sorting processing unit and stores only one of them as the reference image (e) while coordinating with managing information 8 indicating the reference image (e). Then the other medical images are respectively stored while coordinating with managing information indicating the reference image (e) being the base of difference.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a medical image management apparatus and method for filing medical images, and more particularly, to a mode for storing medical images at the time of filing.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art Conventionally, there has been known a medical image management apparatus and method in which acquired medical images are added with management information and stored, and later searched based on the management information and used for diagnosis or the like. . In such a medical image management apparatus and method, since the medical image used for diagnosis is required to have high image quality, it is not preferable that the information amount of the image data is reduced. Was performed, and the obtained information was kept as it was.

[0003]

However, the number of medical images to be managed at medical sites is increasing year by year, and therefore, the capacity of a storage device for storing medical images is a problem. It is not preferable to increase the capacity of the storage device in accordance with the increase in the number of medical images to be stored, since this leads to an economic burden.

[0004] Therefore, it is desired to realize a method and apparatus for storing medical images with a small storage capacity without deteriorating the image quality.

[0005]

According to a first aspect of the present invention, there is provided a medical image management apparatus, comprising: for each set of two or more similar medical images, one of the medical images included in the set; A medical image as a reference image, a reference image storage unit for storing the medical image in association with management information indicating that the medical image is a reference image, and a medical image included in the group, And a difference information storage unit that stores difference information between the medical image and the reference image in association with management information for specifying the reference image.

[0006] Here, "two or more similar medical images" specifically means a series of medical images of the same subject acquired by, for example, CT or MRI. For example, when taking a tomographic image of the head by CT, it is common to take a number of medical images with their cross sections shifted slightly little by little, but a plurality of medical images acquired in this way are similar to each other. It can be said that.

The "set of medical images" means a set of CT images of a patient's head, for example, as one set. This classification may be performed manually by an operator, or may be performed automatically by generating a classification signal according to a predetermined rule.

[0008] The "management information" is information that is required when each stored image is reproduced later. For example, a medical image stored as “difference information from the reference image” is reproduced by adding the difference information to the reference image, so if the reference image cannot be specified,
It cannot be reproduced with the difference information alone. Therefore, when storing the difference information, management information indicating which image the difference information is different from is always required. At this time, the format of the management information may be any format, for example, it may be stored together with the image data as data in a predetermined format, or the management information may be included in the file name of the image data, The image serving as the base of the difference may be known from the name.

Further, the second medical image management apparatus of the present invention uses, for each medical image set including three or more similar medical images, a medical image among the medical images included in the set as a reference. A reference image storage unit for storing the medical image in association with management information indicating that the medical image is a reference image, and one of the medical images included in the set other than the reference image A first difference information storage unit configured to store difference information between the first medical image and the reference image in association with management information for specifying the reference image; In the medical images contained in
Of the one or more second medical images excluding the reference image and the first medical image, a medical image in which difference information from medical images other than the medical image is not stored, the second medical image And second difference information storage means for storing difference information between the difference information stored medical image in which the difference information is stored and management information for specifying the difference information stored medical image. It is characterized by the following.

Here, the "difference information archived medical image"
Includes not only the first medical image in which the difference information is stored by the first difference information storage means, but also the second medical image in which the difference information is stored by the second difference information storage means.

Specifically, for example, when five tomographic images of the head are stored, the first image, the difference information between the first image and the second image, the difference between the second image and the third image, Information, difference information between the third and fourth images, and difference information between the fourth and fifth images are stored in association with management information indicating images serving as bases of the differences. By storing in this way, for example, when reproducing the third image, necessary image information is traced in the order of the second image and the first image based on the management information, and the three images are added up. The second image can be played.

Preferably, the medical image apparatus of the present invention further includes a reference image selecting means for selecting the reference image from a plurality of medical images included in the set.

A first medical image management method of the present invention is a method used by the first medical image management device,
For each medical image set including two or more similar medical images, one medical image in the medical images included in the set is used as a reference image, and the medical image is used as the reference image. Stored in association with management information indicating, of the medical images included in the group, for each medical image other than the reference image, difference information between the medical image and the reference image,
The reference image is stored in association with management information for specifying the reference image.

Further, a second medical image management method of the present invention is a method used by the second medical image management apparatus, wherein the medical image management method comprises the steps of: One medical image among the medical images included in the set is set as a reference image, the medical image is stored in association with management information indicating that the medical image is the reference image, and the medical image included in the set is stored. For one or more first medical images other than the reference image in, the difference information between the first medical image and the reference image, stored in association with the management information that specifies the reference image, In one or more second medical images other than the reference image and the first medical image in the medical images included in the set, difference information from medical images other than the medical image is stored. The second medical image When the difference information between the difference information storage already medical image which the difference information is stored, is characterized in that stored in association with the management information for identifying the said difference information stored already medical images.

[0015]

According to the first medical image management apparatus and method of the present invention, a set of a plurality of similar medical images is used as a storage processing unit, and only one reference image in the set is stored as it is. However, since the other images are stored as difference information from the reference image, storage management of medical images can be performed with a smaller storage capacity than when all images are stored as they are, and information at the time of acquisition is obtained. Since all are stored, a high-quality medical image can be obtained at the time of reproduction.

Further, according to the second medical image management apparatus and method of the present invention, when acquiring the difference information, the difference information does not necessarily have to be the difference from the reference image. In other words, the difference from the most similar image can be obtained, and the amount of information to be stored is further reduced, and the storage management of the medical image can be performed with a smaller storage capacity than the first device and method. it can.

Further, in the above two devices, a reference image selecting means is further provided so that an arbitrary medical image can be selected as a reference image from a plurality of medical images included in the set, thereby providing the first image. In the case of the medical image apparatus, the image in which the sum of the difference information is the smallest can be used as the reference image. In the case of the second medical image apparatus, the number of images to be reproduced is reduced. A reference image can be selected.

[0018]

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS Hereinafter, a medical image management apparatus and method according to the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings. FIG. 1 is a diagram showing an embodiment of the first medical image management apparatus of the present invention. The medical image processing system shown in FIG.
T, MRI, etc., a plurality of diagnostic image capturing apparatuses 1 connected in parallel with multiple channels, and a multi-formatter 2
And a printer 3, a filing system 4, and a disk 5. The medical images acquired by the diagnostic imaging apparatus 1 are digitized and sequentially sent to the multi-formatter. The multi-formatter mainly performs two processes on these medical images. One is a process of preparing a format for printing a medical image (hereinafter, referred to as a format process), and the other is a process of creating management information for filing a medical image (hereinafter, referred to as filing preparation). .

More specifically, the format processing enlarges or reduces a medical image sent from the diagnostic imaging apparatus 1 in accordance with layout information that is separately input or stored in advance, and converts the medical image on a single film. This is the process of locating At this time, a medical image of a predetermined number of frames, for example, 6 frames or 12 frames may be output to one film, but the number of frames output on one film is automatically or artificially given. It is determined by the instruction signal 6. That is, the multi-formatter 2 sequentially receives the input of the medical image, and at the time of receiving the print instruction signal, outputs the received medical images ~ a, b to the printer 3 once, and thereafter receives the next received medical image ~ Is processed, and when the next print instruction signal 6 is received, the medical images c to h received up to that time are output to one film 7 by the printer 3.

The filing preparation is a process of generating management information for filing and preparing a form in which medical images can be stored in a storage unit. In the medical image management apparatus of the present invention, as a preparation for filing, one reference image is selected from a plurality of sets of medical images, difference information with respect to the other images is obtained, and further, the reference Create management information for images and difference information. Each image subjected to the filing preparation processing is stored in a predetermined storage medium such as a disk 5 by the filing system 4.

In this embodiment, the print instruction signal 6 is used to classify a set of medical images as a unit of filing. The print instruction signal 6 is originally 1
A similar medical image that is continuously acquired, such as a tomographic image of the head by CT, is used to determine the number of frames to be output on the film.
Since this signal is output on a single film, this signal is also used for grouping for filing. However, the method of grouping medical images may be any method as long as similar medical images are grouped into one group, and the present embodiment is merely an example. .
For example, a dedicated signal for grouping may be generated according to the CT imaging situation, or a plurality of similar medical images may be selected by an operator and input to the multi-formatter 2.

Next, the selection of the reference image and the acquisition of the difference information will be described in detail. The reference image may be made selectable based on the input order, for example, the image input first to the multi-formatter 2 among a set of input medical images may be used as the reference image. In the case of a tomographic image of the head, the image in the middle in the order of the cross-section may be selected as the reference image in association with the imaging order or the content of the medical image.
As the reference image selection means, a selection switch or the like may be provided in hardware, or a setting screen may be displayed on a monitor (not shown) or the like to be realized as software. The actual selection is made by the operator using such reference image selecting means. At this time, points to be considered when determining the reference image differ depending on the method of acquiring the difference information, and therefore, the difference information acquiring process will be described first.

FIG. 2 is a diagram showing the concept of difference information acquisition processing in the present embodiment. It is assumed that the medical images c to h are classified as one set by the print instruction signal 6 shown in FIG. 1, and the medical image e is selected as the reference image. In the medical image processing apparatus according to the present embodiment,
As shown in FIG. 2, the medical image e is stored as it is, but difference information from the medical image e is acquired for each of the medical images c, d, f, g, and h. The difference information is obtained, for example, by calculating a difference for each corresponding pixel, and a difference image consisting of only a difference value (an image having a difference value for a pixel having a difference and an image having a value of 0 for a pixel having no difference).
Alternatively, the coordinates of the pixel having the difference and the difference value may be associated with each other as one data, and may be stored as a set of such data. Various data formats are conceivable as the data format of such difference information, but any format may be used as long as the amount of information is smaller than that stored as it is.

As shown in the figure, management information 8 is added to the reference image and the difference information. This management information 8
Contains a code indicating that the reference image e is a reference image, and other images include a code indicating the base of the difference, that is, a code indicating the reference image e. In the present embodiment, the management information 8 is data added to the reference image or the difference information, but may be a file name or the like. For example, assuming that the file name at the time of storage is determined in accordance with the rule "" code representing image """code representing base image of difference"", each difference information is ce, de, fe, g
Since the files are stored under the file names e and he, information necessary for reproducing the image can be obtained from the file names, but the management information includes such a case.

Next, another embodiment of the medical image management apparatus and method of the present invention will be described. The medical image management apparatus according to the present embodiment uses a method different from that of the above embodiment for acquiring difference information, but the other processes and the configuration of the apparatus are the same as those of the embodiment shown in FIG. Therefore, the description is omitted.

FIG. 3 is a diagram showing the difference information acquisition processing in the present embodiment. As in the case of FIG. 2, it is assumed that the medical images c to h are classified as one set by the print instruction signal 6 shown in FIG. 1, and among these, the medical image e is selected as the reference image. In this case, similarly to the case of FIG. 2, the medical image e is left as it is, and the difference information from the medical image e is obtained for each of the medical images d and f. The difference from the case of FIG. 2 is that the medical images c, g, and h are not the reference image e, but the medical image c is the difference from the medical image d, the medical image g is the difference from the medical image f, and the medical image h
Is that the difference from the medical image g is acquired and stored. For example, assuming that the medical images c to h are tomographic images of the head, and the acquired cross sections are arranged in the order of c to h, the medical image h has a medical image whose acquired cross section is adjacent to the reference image e compared to the difference from the reference image e. It is expected that the difference from g will be smaller as the information amount. In other words, it is superior to the difference information acquisition method shown in FIG. 2 in terms of saving storage capacity.

Although two embodiments (two difference information obtaining methods) have been described above with reference to FIGS. 2 and 3, the points to be considered when selecting the reference image are as described above. It depends on the difference information acquisition method. First, FIG.
When such a method is used, it is desirable that the reference image is selected such that each difference information is as small as possible.
That is, for example, when the medical images c to h are continuous tomographic images from the tip of the head to the vicinity of the ear, it is expected that the diameter of the cross section is smaller as the picture is closer to the head and larger as the picture is closer to the ear. . Therefore, when a difference from each image is calculated using the medical image c at the forefront as a reference image, the reference image c
And the medical image h become considerably large. On the other hand, if the medical image e is the reference image, the reference image e
Is not so large, and the difference between the reference image e and the medical image c is not so large.

When the method as shown in FIG. 3 is used, it is desirable to select the reference image in consideration of the reproduction efficiency when reproducing the medical image by adding the reference image and the difference image. That is, when the medical image c is used as the reference image, the medical image d can be reproduced from the reference image c and the difference information dc. dc, ed, fe, g-
The six information of f and h-g must be added. On the other hand, if the medical image e is the reference image, the medical image h is different from the reference image e by the difference information fe, gf, hg.
Can be reproduced by adding the four information
Can also be reproduced from the reference image e and the three pieces of information of the difference information de and cd, and it is possible to prevent a problem that the reproduction efficiency of some images is extremely deteriorated.

As described above, according to the medical image management apparatus of the present invention, it is possible to save the storage capacity of the medical image filing without deteriorating the image quality of the medical image. Note that data compression processing can be performed on the reference image and each difference image to further save storage capacity. In this case, the compression method is desirably a reversible method such as Huffman coding. However, if the required image quality level is not so high, any method may be used.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a diagram showing an embodiment of a medical image management apparatus according to the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a diagram showing difference information acquisition processing of the first medical image management apparatus of the present invention.

FIG. 3 is a diagram showing difference information acquisition processing of the second medical image management apparatus of the present invention.

[Explanation of symbols]

 DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 Diagnostic imaging device 2 Multi-formatter 3 Printer 4 Filing system 5 Disk 6 Print instruction signal 7 Film 8 Management information

Claims (5)

[Claims] For each set of two or more similar medical images, one of the medical images included in the set is used as a reference image, and the medical image is used as a reference image. Reference image storage means for storing in association with management information indicating that the image is a reference image, of the medical images included in the set, for each medical image other than the reference image, the medical image and the reference image A medical image management apparatus, comprising: difference information storage means for storing difference information in association with management information for specifying the reference image. 2. For each medical image set including three or more similar medical images, one medical image in the medical images included in the set is used as a reference image, and the medical image is used as the medical image. A reference image storage unit that stores the reference image in association with management information indicating that the image is a reference image, and one of the medical images included in the set other than the reference image.
A first difference information storage unit that stores difference information between the first medical image and the reference image with respect to one or more first medical images in association with management information that specifies the reference image; Among the medical images included in the set, among the one or more second medical images other than the reference image and the first medical image, difference information from medical images other than the medical image is not stored. For a medical image, difference information between the second medical image and the difference information stored medical image in which the difference information is stored is stored in association with management information for specifying the difference information stored medical image. A medical image management device comprising a second difference information storage unit. 3. The medical image management apparatus according to claim 1, further comprising a reference image selecting unit for selecting the reference image from a plurality of medical images included in the set. 4. For each medical image set including two or more similar medical images, one medical image in the medical images included in the set is used as a reference image, and the medical image is used as the medical image. Stored in association with management information indicating that it is a reference image, of the medical images included in the set, for each medical image other than the reference image, the difference information between the medical image and the reference image, A medical image management method characterized by storing in association with management information for specifying a reference image. 5. For each medical image set including three or more similar medical images, one medical image in the medical images included in the set is used as a reference image, and the medical image is used as the medical image. One of the medical images included in the set other than the reference image is stored in association with management information indicating that the image is a reference image.
For at least one first medical image, difference information between the first medical image and the reference image is stored in association with management information for specifying the reference image, and among the medical images included in the set, Among the one or more second medical images excluding the reference image and the first medical image, for the medical image for which difference information from the medical image other than the medical image is not stored, the second image Medical image management, wherein difference information between a medical image and a difference information stored medical image in which the difference information is stored is stored in association with management information for specifying the difference information stored medical image. Method.