[vtkusers] VTK mesh to Dicom (PACS)

[Sebastian Hilbert]

Hi all,

I was wondering if anyone could point me into the right direction. 

Background: We are working with MR data of the heart and are rendering/
segmenting regions of interest to models (e.g. left atrium). Those are then 
exported to STL by a software called Philips Intellispace Portal and 
subsequently converted to VTK. Those meshes/models are then used in clinical 
routine.

Goal: What we would like to achieve somehow is to store these VTK meshes in a 
PACS for data exchange. From what I have understood so far it is not possible 
to store VTK meshes in a PACS. What would you suggest ? Is this something that 
can be implemented ?

There seems to be some related bits in the Dicom specification but I am stuck 
here.

ftp://medical.nema.org/medical/dicom/final/sup132_ft.pdf


My research also led me to two solutions by medical device vendors who seem to 
have implemented a way to store their model formats in Dicom file(s). One 
solution Ensite NavX by St. Jude Medical seems to store the XML (VTK ascii 
like) content in a private tag and the other company seems to store (VTK 
binary ?) data in private tags as well.

I do have sample Dicom files from both products as well as the file format 
specifications for both products.

I wonder what it would take to come up with a solution based on the specs and 
the sample files. If anyone could point me into the right direction that would 
be great.

Regards,
Sebastian