Patent ID: 7366992

Claim:
A method for displaying and/or manipulating medical image data, the method comprising: (a) receiving, with a medical image viewer in compliance with a medical image standard and comprising medical-image-standard-compliant software, a file in compliance with the medical image standard, wherein the medical image standard specifies a first field for data not in compliance with the medical image standard and a second field for data in compliance with the medical image standard, wherein the first field of the file comprises medical image data and the second field of the file comprises information that can be used to obtain software to at least one of display and manipulate the medical image data; (b) with the medical-image-standard-compliant software, reading, from the second field, the information that can be used to obtain software to at least one of display and manipulate the medical image data; (c) obtaining the software identified by the information in the second field; (d) performing at least one of the following with the software obtained in (c): displaying the medical image data and manipulating the medical image data; wherein the medical image standard comprises Digital Imaging and Communications in Medicine (DICOM), and wherein the first field of the medical image standard comprises a DICOM private attribute, and wherein the second field of the medical image standard comprises a DICOM standard attribute.