SIIM

Radiology reporting on the GE Healthcare Centricity RIS just got smarter with an intelligent algorithm that senses when dictated cases don’t sound right. This “thought checker,” scheduled to begin routine shipment by the end of this year as an upgrade to the Centricity RIS-IC Reporting module, uses the context of reports to identify possible errors. The program, for example, might question whether the radiologist meant “left occipital lobe” rather than “right” by highlighting the directional term in blue. Or it might insert a red bar at a point where certain information needs to be added.

Brit Systems reached out to imaging centers, clinics, and offices at the Society for Imaging Informatics in Medicine meeting with PACS bundles. The company also unveiled a package to support outsourced radiology reading services.

Siemens Healthcare in its booth highlighted syngo TrueD, a multimodality application for oncology. TrueD registers data sets obtained using PET/CT, SPECT/CT, CT, and MR, allowing exams of patients scanned at different times -- before and after therapy, for instance -- to be compared. Differences found in these comparisons may inform decisions about whether to continue or modify treatment. In addition to registration and visualization, TrueD performs quantitative measures that can document changes at up to three time points. Rigid and nonrigid methods for structure comparisons include navigational tools that support visual alignment and matching landmarks.

Philips Healthcare focused attention in its booth on the company’s IT “ecosystem” of about a dozen suppliers of software products that work with its iSite PACs. Philips presented an à la carte approach to the selection of various complementary products, exemplified by Amirsys’ STATdx Diagnostic Decision Support System, which provides reference tools useful in the diagnostic process.

A new storage appliance, iMed-Stor, debuted at the Candelis booth. The DICOM-compliant archive appliance was engineered to securely and cost-effectively manage digital medical images, ideally from a single digital modality. It can be configured to work seamlessly alongside any PACS, according to the company, and can be outfitted with an optional web-based viewer, enabling radiologists to read images from any location offering a secure Internet connection.

Foresight Imaging is previewing at the SIIM conference version 2.2 of its TIMS DICOM software, which helps facilities still using non-DICOM medical modalities to convert to DICOM.

Image analysis and reporting functionality are on display at Carestream’s SIIM booth, where the company is showcasing its latest generation of computed radiography systems, the Kodak DIRECTVIEW Classic and Elite CR systems.

PACS/IT developer RamSoft debuted its PowerServer RIS/PACS at the SIIM conference, framing the new product as a true integration between RIS and PACS, free of HL7 interfacing. The company designed the web-based PowerServer RIS/PACS as the means for small facilities to increase efficiency, while allowing an upgrade path from existing PowerServer PACS installations.

As the SIIM conference opened, Nuance unveiled a new version of its speech recognition product PowerScribe, incorporating enhancements and integration designed to improve radiology workflow. Version 5.0 offers a concentrated focus on accurate, comprehensive, and readily available clinical documentation, according to the company.

It wasn’t intended as a formal roundtable, but a question from the radiology news media -- what are the biggest challenges facing the field -- led some SIIM veterans, participants on a panel assembled by the association, into discussion Thursday of a laundry list of issues facing radiology informatics. Their comments also produced some insights into hot topics to watch in the future.

Konica Minolta Medical Imaging USA framed its ImagePilot CR system, introduced at the Society for Imaging Informatics in Medicine (SIIM) meeting in Seattle, as a new concept in digital radiography. ImagePilot CR, designed as an integrated digital imaging acquisition, review, and storage solution specifically for physician clinics, simplifies image acquisition to a single button push.

A system presented at the SIIM meeting is able to develop work lists based on a patient’s insurance and a radiologist’s credentialing status, important considerations as more and more studies are interpreted away from central offices and facilities try to maximize reimbursement.

Medical archiving and storage specialist InSite One is showing at SIIM a new bundle of recovery services, part of a promotion the company plans to run through December 2008. Dubbed InDex Recovery with Recovery Plus, the bundle automatically backs up PACS databases within the company’s Intelligent Management Gateway, while sending a copy of the data to a primary InSite One warehouse.

IT giant McKesson has acquired Vivalog, a provider of web-based products that enable radiologists and other imaging specialists to organize and share image and reference case information used in daily practice. One such product, MyPACS.net, a web-based community for radiology decision support and information exchange, houses 18,000 reference cases depicting thousands of diseases.

Although it offers tremendous opportunities for advances in imaging interpretation and communication with referring clinicians, advanced visualization still stumbles when it comes to workflow, according to a presentation Friday.

Changes in images introduced by compression algorithms at levels as low as 8:1 can be observed by readers when they are compared with uncompressed images, according to a research report presented at the Society of Imaging Informatics in Medicine conference Thursday.

Practice meets theory at the Society for Imaging Informatics in Medicine 2008 Annual Meeting, May 15-18, in Seattle. The SIIM meeting has always provided a collegial environment for practical education and demonstration combined with the latest research and science in imaging informatics.

There will come a day when radiologists enter a reading room and go to a station where the chair, workstation, lighting, and ambient temperature settings will all automatically adjust to optimized preset preferences. Until that day, however, radiologists will have to suffer in substandard working conditions unless they take takes steps to personally adjust their environment or someone in the radiology department becomes a champion for the cause of better reading room design.

As radiology becomes more and more digital, teaching files can be created faster and more easily if appropriately integrated with other applications, according to Dr. Luciano Prevedello at Brigham and Women’s Hospital.

While the cost of PACS has declined in the last decade, the system is still a major investment that requires careful planning, implementation, and follow-up, according to speakers on Sunday, the last day of the Society for Imaging Informatics in Medicine meeting in Providence.

Researchers involved in a large multicenter trial have combined readily available technology with a customized data collection and reporting process that has enabled them to minimize costs while reading the studies in a timely manner. The technology and expertise used can be adapted to just about any clinical research study with digital imaging requirements, according to a scientific paper presented at the Society for Imaging Informatics in Medicine meeting in Providence.

One hundred radiology and information technologists took a pilot exam Saturday that will allow them to become certified imaging informatics professionals. The test is a new step in the drive to bring professional recognition to the management of radiology informatics systems.

A suite of teleradiology products and services launched at the SIIM meeting will improve efficiency by intelligently routing studies, according to its developer, CoActiv Medical. The suite, called Exam-Net, focuses on image distribution, reading, and archiving. Its Acquire & Forward Server receives studies directly from multiple modalities or an existing PACS, automatically sending them for temporary storage to a hosted Exam-Net server at one of CoActiv's data centers, or to an onsite imaging location. The hosted server can be programmed for "intelligent" imaging forwarding, automatically routing studies to appropriate radiologists at any location.

Siemens Medical Solutions put its syngo Suite in the spotlight at SIIM 2007 as the means to an advanced level of interoperability and flexibility for imaging centers. The product, a hybrid IT that integrates RIS, PACS, postprocessing, and patient data handling, brings image management and practice management together in an easy-to-use package.

Mercury Computer introduced enhanced 3D tools and application workflow for CT angiography at the SIIM meeting. The enhancements, part of Visage CS Thin Client/Server 2.2, address 3D and 4D image interpretation, postprocessing, and distribution tasks possible within the PACS workflow anywhere in the hospital enterprise. Bone removal for CT runoff studies automatically subtracts leg bone, pelvic bone, and spine to illuminate vascular structures. A new integrated suite of analytical tools defines and traces vessels and performs curved planar reformatting or a straightened lumen view. A Cardiac CT Analysis Package features 4D Cardiac CT data support, including coronary vessel analysis and left ventricular function analysis.

Because PACS administrators come from various backgrounds and a site may have multiple systems from various vendors, fixing problems in a timely fashion can be challenging. To address this concern, PACS administrators at the University of Maryland Medical System have designed a wiki to build a collaborative decision support and knowledge repository for supporting a PACS.

Last year, the Society for Imaging Informatics in Medicine attracted 24 essays from residents and other trainees vying to win travel reimbursement to the meeting. This year, the society received no essays, according to Dr. Barton F. Branstetter IV, chair of the SIIM education committee, who moderated a morning resident roundtable session.

Reprising the old joke about how many people it takes to change a lightbulb, radiologists were asked Friday how many workstations it takes to solve a given clinical question. Their answer: way too many.

Tools for managing an outsourced radiology service premiered at the Neurostar booth during the SIIM meeting. New additions to the company's Virtual Radiology Network include enhanced schedule-based routing of studies and custom management reporting tools supporting both real-time dashboard style and retrospective information. Digital recording, web-based transcription, custom structured report templates, and voice recognition have also been added, along with automated billing and cost-analysis reporting.

Native 3D and postprocessing capabilities are taking center stage at the Carestream Health booth during the Society for Imaging Informatics in Medicine conference June 7 to 10. Volumetric capability and other advanced functions are embedded into the latest version of the company’s Carestream PACS, which will begin shipping the end of this month. Also built into the enhanced system are image fusion, orthopedic surgical templating, and cardiac functions.