A web client-based online DICOM browser and NRRD converter for Studierfenster

Imaging data within the clinical practice in general uses standardized formats such as Digital Imaging and Communications in Medicine (DICOM). Aside from 3D volume data, DICOM files usually include relational and semantic description information. The majority of current applications for browsing and viewing DICOM files online handle the image volume data only, ignoring the relational component of the data. Alternatively, implementations that show the relational information are provided as complete pre-packaged solutions that are difficult to integrate in existing projects and workflows. This publication proposes a modular, client-side web application for viewing DICOM volume data and displaying DICOM description fields containing relational and semantic information. Furthermore, it supports conversion from DICOM data sets into the nearly raw raster data (NRRD) format, which is commonly utilized for research and academic environments, because of its simpler, easily processable structure, and the removal of all patient DICOM tags (anonymization). The application was developed in JavaScript and integrated into the online medical image processing framework StudierFenster (http://studierfenster.tugraz.at/). Since our application only requires a standard web browser, it can be used by everyone and can be easily deployed in any wider project without a complex software architecture.