DICOM Metadata Analysis for Population Studies

Abstract

This article reports an experimental study to determine how to use the stored Digital Imaging and Communication in Medicine (DICOM) metadata to perform population studies. As a case study, it was considered three types of medical imaging studies (i.e. routine head computed tomography, thorax computed radiography and thorax digital radiography) stored in the picture archiving and communication systems (PACS) of three healthcare institutions. The final sample consisted of DICOM metadata belonging to 1370360 images, corresponding to 109160 medical imaging studies performed on 72716 patients. The study followed a methodological approach that allows the identification of the number of patients with performed studies by age group and gender, as well as the average number of studies by patient, age group and gender in each one of the three healthcare institutions. The results show the relevance of the aggregation and analyses of DICOM metadata stored in heterogeneous PACS facilities.