PACS Eliminates Lost Film and Improves Efficiencies at Hamilton County Public Hospital

Challenge

The increased headache and costs associated with searching for lost film, as well as the desire to improve the efficiency of various processes within the Radiology department, prompted Hamilton County Hospital to search for a better way.

Solution

Hamilton partnered with Aspyra to implement its AccessNET™ PACS (picture archive and communications systems) and clinical image management solutions.

Results

Annual film costs immediately decreased by $22,000, and the solution has provided the hospital with additional capabilities to distribute images to clinicians for referrals.

Hamilton County Public Hospital is a 25-bed facility located about 75 miles north of Des Moines, the state capital. Hamilton began searching for PACS solutions in 2004 and implemented Aspyra‘s AccessNET PACS in January 2005.

“A few of the reasons we decided to purchase a PACS system were to avoid lost film and to simplify the process for providing imaging studies to outside providers” said Matt McKinney, Hamilton's Director of Radiology. “Tracking film that was loaned out was time consuming, and many times the film would not be returned at all and was permanently lost. The whole process of tracking outgoing and incoming film, calling to get film returned, or not having the films available for comparison if they were lost, was very inefficient”

“With the Aspyra solution, we‘ve eliminated all of this,” McKinney continued. “We can easily burn CDs with the images and send them to any physician that needs to review them. The CDs include image viewing software, and the radiologist‘s dictated report is sent with the CD. Any PC with a CD-ROM drive can view the images.”

Additional benefits include the ability for multiple physicians in different locations to review a patient‘s images simultaneously. This has increased efficiency in scenarios where specialists at different locations need to be consulted. Instead of waiting for the film to be routed, CDs can be sent or images can be securely viewed over the Internet.

Hamilton is using Aspyra‘s AccessNET PACS solution, which includes AccessServer™ and four image review workstations using MedVIEW®. AccessServer acts as the “control tower” of the system and provides security, routing, automatic tasks, print management, archive management, access to information stored in the database, and more. MedVIEW is viewing software that provides a method to view clinical images and reports in a filmless environment. Aspyra‘s AccessNET solutions are interfaced to the following modalities: ultrasound, computed tomography, magnetic resonance imaging, and nuclear medicine.

“One of the biggest benefits for a community hospital like ours is that the radiologists can securely access the images off site. Because we are no longer storing the images on film but are storing them digitally in the PACS system, the radiologists can access the imaging studies remotely and can even dictate reports from home, if they want to,” McKinney said. “This dramatically improves their efficiency and the report turnaround time, which improves the care we are providing to the patient.”