Spine Labelling

Spine Labeling is a powerful tool which allow a reading physician to easily label different vertebrae and disks within a spine study. This is done so that the referring physician is able to interpret study results with ease.

Spine Labeling from the Annotation Tools toolbar is only viewable when the active study contains a sagittal series. If another study is selected from the Patient Explorer, the Spine Labeling button only appear once a sagittal, axial, coronal or mixed series is selected to be displayed.

When using spine labeling, all images must have the same Frame of Reference UID in order to be spatially compared, i.e., the DICOM tag (0020,0052) FrameOfReferenceUID must be identical for all framesets for spine labeling to work.

Clicking the button opens the Spine Labeling window, which contains a General, Advanced, and View tab.

In the Vertebrae section of the General tab, the Currently at drop-down menu allow a reading physician to select the vertebra to be labeled next. The default value in the dropdown is automatically set based on the Body Part that is currently loaded. Valid Body Parts are CSPINE, LSPINE, TSPINE. If the Body Part is unknown, the value is set to C1. The drop-down is automatically incremented to the next vertebra label once one is used. The Label L6 between L5 and S1 checkbox lets a reading physician to label the vertebra L6 between L5 and S1. The Direction section of the General tab determines which way the drop-down items are incremented.

In the Rename section of the Advanced tab, the Increment and Decrement buttons allow a reading physician to increment or decrement the vertebrae labels already placed on the spine by one. The Edit section of the Advanced tab allow a reading physician to edit the labels already placed on an image. The Delete Last button will remove the last label put on the spine. The Delete All button removes all spine labels from the study.

In the View tab, selecting the Show X marks on label checkbox will keep displaying the X's used to draw each label. Selecting the Show arrows on label checkbox display arrows pointing from the label to the vertebra. If not selected, the label will be put directly on the vertebra.

The labeling of the spine is in the sagittal view of the spine study. Once a vertebra is marked on the sagittal slice, the vertebra and disks in the axial view will be automatically labeled. Detect Body Part correctly when it is CSPINE, LSPINE, TSPINE. L_SPINE is not a valid DICOM body part.

To label a vertebra, click the Spine Labeling button and configure all the settings as needed. With the Spine Labeling window still open, click the top of the vertebra to label. Next, select the bottom of the same vertebra. This will create a label for the vertebra between the two points, in this case, S1. Once the label is created on the sagittal image, it will automatically appear at the top of the axial image in the same plane.