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The trend toward consolidation in the healthcare industry continues to climb, with U.S. hospital mergers and acquisitions at their highest since 1999.
At the surface, the term “advanced visualization†seems nebulous at best. Medical imaging technology continues to develop and advance at a rapid rate, so determining what qualifies as advanced remains a moving target as well. In general, however, the current cutting edge of imaging centers around 3-D/4-D viewing and mobile technology, with different specialties implementing them in unique ways.
Brit Systems announced the release of WebWorks QC, an optional module for the company’s WebWorks zero footprint image browser that provides advanced study quality control (QC) functionality.
Brit Systems Inc. has been acquired by Imaging Advantage (IA) LLC. Brit Systems LLC will operate as a wholly owned subsidiary of IA.
Imaging is critical to all medical specialties so it is logical that images should be available to specialists outside of radiology. There is a trend to reduce repeat exams by making images more easily accessible, including prior exams. This traditionally has been accomplished using the cumbersome process of mailing or physically carrying CDs to referring physicians. Often these CDs do not open or take a long time to download. Stage 2 Meaningful Use requirements for certified electronic medical records (EMR) also call for the sharing of medical images electronically to help improve efficiency and reduce healthcare costs. All of these factors have given rise to remote image access systems.
Today’s digital picture archiving and communication systems (PACS) is highlighted with several choice words around the industry: accessible, flexible, Web-based, thin client versus thick client and vendor-neutral. Whatever term is used to describe the PACS of today and the future, one thing is clear: the aim now is to be able to store medical images, sourced from any modality, in a secure location on a network and retrieve them for review from any platform or any device.
Several industries have used cloud solutions for many years, but cloud computing only recently started to be used in healthcare. According to the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), cloud computing is defined as “a model for enabling convenient, on-demand network access to a shared pool of configurable computing resources (e.g., networks, servers, storage, applications and services) that can be rapidly provisioned and released with minimal management effort or service provider interaction.”1 As more and more healthcare organizations (HCOs) adopt electronic medical records (EMRs), the cloud database has offered an efficient solution for image sharing, particularly in radiology where it is bridging the gap between referring physicians and radiologists.
Brit Systems Inc., an image management and IT solutions company, announced it is partnering with Radiolopolis, a global, online community for radiology professionals, to image enable the launch of Consult Me, a peer review consultation capability on the Radiolopolis Radiology Network.
Today’s remote viewing systems will stimulate changes and challenges in healthcare in a manner similar to what online banking has done for the financial industry. The areas of improvement include safe, secure, remote access from any browser, or ultimately any mobile device. This is the reality of today, and it comes without the need for special applications or image and associated data downloads from virtually any source.
If you are part of a health system that has spent months building and designing a new picture archive and communications system (PACS), it is undoubtedly an exciting time. Reaching the point of PACS activation and getting staff up and running is a true milestone. Once your company reaches this point, it may feel like the hard work is over and that it is time to take a deep breath, but in reality there is still much more to do and questions that have to be answered in order to fully support your organization during and post PACS go-live.