Overview
ISO/TR 24936:2026 - Health informatics - Endoscopic video and related clinical information is an international technical report developed by ISO/TC 215. This document focuses on the data structures required for video data, image recording devices, and associated clinical information specific to endoscopic procedures. It addresses the video and related clinical metadata captured during endoscopies and laparoscopies, but does not include static images or audio tracks. The primary goal is to standardize how procedural video data is recorded, described, and linked to clinical metadata to support interoperability, evidence retention, clinical education, and the development of advanced medical devices and analytics tools.
Key Topics
- Endoscopic and Laparoscopic Video Data: Covers characteristics important to video data captured during minimally invasive procedures, such as duration, resolution, frame rate, and encoding format.
- Clinical Metadata (Case Report Forms): Describes the essential contextual clinical data elements recorded before, during, and after procedures, including patient demographics, procedural details, and surgical outcomes.
- Data Structure and Interoperability: Presents a framework for representing both video and clinical metadata in a structured, consistent manner, facilitating integration and further processing.
- Reference to Existing Standards: Highlights alignment and referencing with widely used health informatics standards such as DICOM, emphasizing compatibility and adoption in clinical environments.
- Data Formats and Quality: Lists typical file formats (e.g., MPEG, MOV, AVI), video codecs (H.264, H.265), and attributes determining image quality to ensure recorded video is usable for clinical and research purposes.
- Challenges and Recommendations: Discusses the variability and limitations in current practices due to heterogeneous device ecosystems and varying levels of recording quality and metadata completeness.
Applications
The standardization of endoscopic video data and its associated clinical information provides practical value across several healthcare and research domains:
- Record Keeping and Evidence Retention: Enables robust archiving of surgical video with detailed clinical metadata to support follow-up treatment, quality audits, and legal or regulatory evidence requirements.
- Clinical Education and Training: Facilitates the use of procedural videos for training surgeons by ensuring consistent, high-quality video and linked clinical context, while supporting privacy protection and access control.
- Medical Device Research and Development: Supports the utilization of curated, well-annotated video datasets for testing and developing AI-driven surgical assistance systems, enhancing the efficiency of machine learning in healthcare.
- Interoperability and Data Sharing: Promotes standardized video and clinical data exchange across medical institutions and research networks, improving data accessibility and secondary use for research or analytics.
- Quality Improvement and Analytics: Enables systematic review, benchmarking, and quality improvement initiatives by providing structured data suitable for automated analysis and decision support tools.
Related Standards
ISO/TR 24936:2026 integrates with and references several important health informatics standards:
- DICOM (Digital Imaging and Communications in Medicine): The principal international standard for managing medical imaging information, including video and associated metadata. See ISO 12052 for comprehensive DICOM specifications.
- FHIR (Fast Healthcare Interoperability Resources): Modern framework for exchanging healthcare information electronically, supporting the integration of clinical records and metadata from various sources.
- DICOM Structured Reports (SR): Used for transmitting clinical context alongside imaging data, facilitating rich annotation of endoscopic videos.
- Other ISO/TC 215 Standards: Includes interoperability frameworks for electronic health records and healthcare device communications.
By establishing a structured approach for endoscopic video and related clinical information, ISO/TR 24936:2026 helps advance digital health, foster the secondary use of healthcare video data, and align clinical practices with the latest developments in medical informatics and device innovation.