Patient CD import / cleanup

Import an outside-patient CD and normalize its inconsistent tags.

Problem

A patient brings a CD from an outside facility containing their imaging. The CD often contains non-DICOM files (viewer executables, PDF reports), DICOMDIR index files, and possibly corrupted or zero-byte DICOM files. You need to import only valid DICOM files and organize them correctly.

Steps

1. Load the CD contents — click Open files… (⌘O) and select all files from the CD directory. Let dcmage handle the parsing.
2. Observe the load results — valid DICOM files are loaded into the study tree. Corrupted files are skipped with a “skipped X files” notification. Non-DICOM files are silently ignored.
3. Review the study tree — click the Files tab in the right rail. Verify the patient/study/series hierarchy is correctly parsed.
4. Purge unnecessary files — use the structural tools to remove scout/localizer images (if not clinically needed), deduplicate repeated SOP instances, and drop any corrupted instances that slipped through.
5. Verify metadata — check Patient Name, Patient ID, and Study Date match the outside facility records. Edit discrepancies in Edit mode (⌘3).

Result

Valid files from the CD load into the study tree with the right hierarchy while corrupted, zero-byte, and non-DICOM files are skipped with a clear message and no crash. From there you can purge scout/localizer images and deduplicate repeated SOP instances.