Regular and precise inspection of the realization of the local nuclear medicine standard operation procedures (SOPs) is very complex and time-consuming, especially when large amount of patient data is obtained from a wide scale of different scan procedures on a daily basis. DICOM metadata comprise a complete set of data related to the patient and the imaging procedure, and consequently all information necessary to evaluate the compliance with the actual SOP. Q-Bot, an automatic DICOM metadata monitoring tool which is capable to verify SOP conformities, was tested for 11 months at two nuclear medicine departments. Relevant parameters, such as patient ID, patient mass and height, injected activity, and uptake time, were investigated in the case of adult 18F-FDG whole-body PET/CT and 99mTc-MDP gamma camera bone scans on a daily basis. Q-Bot automatically inspected the actual SOP compliance of these relevant DICOM parameters. Q-Bot graphical user interface (GUI) provided a summary of the outliers in a table format to be investigated by a dedicated technologist. In addition, information related to the error handling was also collected for retrospective analysis of long-term tendencies. In total, 6702 PET/CT and 2502 gamma camera scans were inspected, from which 8581 were confirmed as valid patient study without errors. Discrepancies related to the lack of a parameter, not appropriate format, or improper scan procedures were found in 623 cases, and 156 out of these were corrected before the medical reading and reporting. SOP non-conformities explored with Q-Bot were found to be non-correctable in 467 cases. Systematic errors to our practice turned out to be the manual radiopharmaceutical injection, the allowance to use both SI and non-SI units, and the clear definition of decimal point symbol to use. The daily evaluation of Q-Bot results provided early detection of errors and consequently ensured the minimization of error propagation. Integration of a QM software that inspects protocol compliance at a nuclear medicine department provides significant support to detect non-conformities for technologists, and much higher confidence in image quality for physicians.

中文翻译：

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Q-Bot：自动进行DICOM元数据监控，以实现核医学质量管理的新水平

对本地核医学标准操作程序（SOP）的实现进行定期和精确的检查非常复杂且耗时，尤其是在每天从大量不同的扫描程序中获取大量患者数据时。DICOM元数据包括与患者和成像程序有关的完整数据集，因此包括评估与实际SOP的依从性所需的所有信息。Q-Bot是一种能够验证SOP符合性的DICOM自动元数据监视工具，已在两个核医学部门进行了11个月的测试。每天在成人18F-FDG全身PET / CT和99mTc-MDPγ摄象机骨扫描的情况下，调查相关参数，例如患者ID，患者体重和身高，注射活动和摄取时间。Q-Bot自动检查了这些相关DICOM参数的实际SOP符合性。Q-Bot图形用户界面（GUI）以表格格式提供了异常值的摘要，将由专门的技术人员进行调查。此外，还收集了与错误处理有关的信息，以便对长期趋势进行回顾性分析。总共检查了6702项PET / CT和2502γ照相机扫描，从中确认8581项是有效的患者研究，没有错误。在623例病例中发现了与缺乏参数，格式不正确或扫描程序不当相关的差异，其中有156例在医学阅读和报告之前已得到纠正。发现在467例病例中，用Q-Bot探索的SOP不符合项是不可纠正的。我们实践中的系统错误是手动放射性药物注射，允许同时使用SI和非SI单位以及要使用的小数点符号的明确定义。Q-Bot结果的每日评估提供了错误的早期检测，因此确保了错误传播的最小化。在核医学部门检查协议符合性的QM软件的集成为技术人员提供了重要的支持，以发现不合格之处，并为医生提供了更高的图像质量信心。