spectrIm-QMRS
Version 3.0.1 Alpha
Clinical workflow background
DICOM is the language that clinical imaging systems use to store, identify, exchange, and archive medical imaging objects. For a clinical spectroscopy application, DICOM support is not just a convenience: it is the bridge between advanced MRS(I) processing and the clinical systems where patient examinations are acquired, reviewed, and documented.
DICOM, Digital Imaging and Communications in Medicine, is both a file format and a network protocol. A DICOM object contains the actual image, spectroscopy, or report data plus structured metadata: patient identity, study and series identifiers, acquisition dates, modality, scanner parameters, geometry, and many other tags.
The same standard also defines how scanners, PACS archives, workstations, and research tools communicate. Each network endpoint has an AE title, IP address, and port. A DICOM sender and receiver must agree on these identifiers before clinical data can move safely between systems.
MRS(I) data are meaningful only when they remain attached to the correct patient, study, anatomical image context, acquisition geometry, echo time, field strength, and scanner-specific spectroscopy tags. DICOM import keeps this context available to the application.
In routine imaging environments, data are sent from MR scanners, PACS, or DICOM routers. A spectroscopy application that can act as a DICOM receiver fits into this ecosystem instead of requiring manual file conversions as the first step.
MRS(I) interpretation depends on anatomy. Receiving DICOM image series and spectroscopy series together allows spectrIm-QMRS to mount the examination, show the voxel grid in image context, and link spectra to anatomical location.
DICOM metadata records how the data were acquired and how objects relate to each other. This is essential when processing results need to be checked, repeated, compared, or explained later.
Advanced spectroscopy processing is only clinically useful if the result can leave the research workstation in a form that hospital systems understand. DICOM output allows screenshots, imported images, maps, and MRS(I) reporting objects to be associated with the same examination context and sent back to a configured DICOM node.
In spectrIm-QMRS, Secondary Capture export uses the last loaded spectroscopy DICOM examination as context. This keeps the exported object tied to the correct patient and study, while new Series and SOP Instance UIDs are derived for the generated DICOM object.
spectrIm-QMRS combines clinical DICOM import and networking with spectroscopy-specific workflows such as water removal, denoising, voxel selection, metabolite map creation, and interactive quality control.
The integrated ILV workflow simulates basis-set responses using Liouville-von Neumann equation integration, allowing model creation to be adapted to the loaded spectroscopy examination.
Advanced prior-knowledge based fitting, including the pthreads-TDFDFit CPU path, supports quantitative analysis of MRS(I) data after preprocessing and basis-set/model preparation.
The application can create DICOM formatted visual documentation from the Clinical Viewer or local images and send those objects to configured DICOM nodes. This closes the loop from scanner data to spectroscopy processing and back to clinical DICOM infrastructure.
A typical clinical spectroscopy workflow starts by receiving or mounting DICOM data, then inspecting images and spectra together, selecting relevant voxels or regions, preprocessing the signals, simulating or selecting basis-set information, fitting the data, and finally creating visual or quantitative output suitable for review.
The distinctive point is not one feature in isolation. It is the connection between hospital-compatible DICOM I/O and sophisticated spectroscopy methods that are usually found in specialist research environments.