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databasedicomhipaa

Storing DICOM headers in SQL & HIPAA


I am reading DICOM headers and storing them in a database. Is there a list of DICOM objects that need to be store encrypted or anonymized in order to be HIPAA compliant?

This is the sort of list of DICOM tags we are storing: PatientID, PatientsName, PatientsBirthDate, StudyDate, StudyInstanceUid, SopInstanceUid, etc...


Solution

  • Interesting question. I've never come across a specific list that is ordered by dicom tag.

    There is a dicom header anonymizer written as a Ruby gem (Ruby-Dicom).

    Looking at it's source code here, I see that these are the fields they chose to address starting around line #663:

      ["0008,0012", "20000101", false], # Instance Creation Date
      ["0008,0013", "000000.00", false], # Instance Creation Time
      ["0008,0020", "20000101", false], # Study Date
      ["0008,0023", "20000101", false], # Image Date
      ["0008,0030", "000000.00", false], # Study Time
      ["0008,0033", "000000.00", false], # Image Time
      ["0008,0050", "", true], # Accession Number
      ["0008,0080", "Institution", true], # Institution name
      ["0008,0090", "Physician", true], # Referring Physician's name
      ["0008,1010", "Station", true], # Station name
      ["0008,1070", "Operator", true], # Operator's Name
      ["0010,0010", "Patient", true], # Patient's name
      ["0010,0020", "ID", true], # Patient's ID
      ["0010,0030", "20000101", false], # Patient's Birth Date
      ["0010,0040", "N", false], # Patient's Sex
      ["0020,4000", "", false], # Image Comments