Overview: Definitions

The following definitions pertain to Information Object Definitions and are commonly used in the DICOM Standard.

Attribute tag:

A unique identifier for an Attribute of an Information Object composed of an ordered pair of numbers (a Group Number followed by an Element number).

Composite IOD:

an Information Object Definition which represents parts of several entities in the DICOM Application Model. Such an IOD includes Attributes which are not inherent in the Real-World Object that the IOD represents but rather are inherent in related Real-World Objects.

Derived image:

an image in which the pixel data was constructed from pixel data of one or more other images (source images).

DICOM information model:

an Entity-Relationship diagram which is used to model the relationships between the Information Object Definitions representing classes of Real-World Objects defined by the DICOM Application Model.

DICOM application model:

an Entity-Relationship diagram used to model the relationships between Real-World Objects which are within the area of interest of the DICOM Standard.

Information entity:

that portion of information defined by a Composite IOD which is related to one specific class of Real-World Object. There is a one-to-one correspondence between Information Entities and entities in the DICOM Application Model.

Information object definition (IOD):

a data abstraction of a class of similar Real-World Objects which defines the nature and Attributes relevant to the class of Real-World Objects represented.

Module:

A set of Attributes within an Information Entity or Normalized IOD which are logically related to each other.

Multi-frame image:

Image that contains multiple two-dimensional pixel planes.

Normalized IOD:

an Information Object Definition which represents a single entity in the DICOM Application Model. Such an IOD includes Attributes which are only inherent in the Real-World Object that the IOD represents.

Cine run:

A set of temporally related frames acquired at constant or variable frame rates. This term incorporates the general class of serialography.