The communication concept of a regional stroke unit network based on encrypted image transmission and the DICOM-mail standard

This paper describes the communication concept for a regional stroke network for the exchange of medical images and reports. The data transfer is realized with regular C-mail (SMTP). DICOM images are sent as DICOM compliant attachments. Private key encryption is used to ensure data security and privacy. All used protocols are standardized or de-facto standards and allow vendor-independent communication. Different problems and options of the concept realization are discussed.