Cooperative grid based picture archiving and communication system

A cooperative grid based picture archiving and communication system with a three level working structure comprising:

• (a) a plurality of agent nodes, each agent node comprising a grid agent comprising a computer processor and agent software executable on the computer processor for receiving image data from an associated picture archiving and communications system (PACS), each PACS comprising an image database containing image data including image registration information;
• (b) a master node comprising a computer processor and master software executable on the computer processor, the master node being connected to each of the agent nodes via a network;
• and
• (c) a client end comprising a computer processor and client end software executable on the computer processor, the client end being connected to the master node via the network for initiating queries for the image data;
• wherein the grid agent of each agent node (i) obtains image information from the agent node's associated PACS, (ii) compiles a manifest of image registration information from the image data in the PACS image database, the manifest including, for each image, information sufficient to retrieve the image data from the PACS database, and (iii) transmits the manifest to the master node,
• wherein the manifest comprises registration information regarding a plurality of images stored in the agent node's associated PACS,
• wherein when the master node receives the manifest, the master node parses the manifest to extract the registration information, and stores the registration information for the plurality of images in a master node database,
• and wherein when the master node receives a query for image data from the client end, the master node searches the master node database to determine whether the image data is available in one of the PACSs, and if the image data is available in one of the PACSs, the master node provides information to the client end sufficient to access the image data.