title: Bridging the gap: linking a legacy hospital information system with a filmless radiology picture archiving and communications system within a nonhomogeneous environment.
abstract: A health level 7 (HL7)-conformant data link to exchange information between the mainframe hospital information system (HIS) of our hospital and our home-grown picture archiving and communications system (PACS) is a result of a collaborative effort between the HIS department and the PACS development team. Based of the ability to link examination requisitions and image studies, applications have been generated to optimise workflow and to improve the reliability and distribution of radiology information. Now, images can be routed to individual radiologists and clinicians; worklists facilitate radiology reporting; applications exist to create, edit, and view reports and images via the internet; and automated quality control now limits the incidence of "lost" cases and errors in image routing. By following the HL7 standard to develop the gateway to the legacy system, the development of a radiology information system for booking, reading, reporting, and billing remains universal and does not preclude the option to integrate off-the-shelf commercial products.
authors.affiliation: Department of Diagnostic Radiology, McGill University Health Centre, Montreal, Quebec, Canada.
authors.forename: R K
authors.initials: RK
authors.lastname: Rubin
authors.forename: C J
authors.initials: CJ
authors.lastname: Henri
authors.forename: R D
authors.initials: RD
authors.lastname: Cox
mesh_terms: D003195:Computer Communication Networks; D003628:Database Management Systems; D003952:Diagnostic Imaging; D006751:Hospital Information Systems / Q000458:organization & administration; D006801:Humans; D016247:Information Storage and Retrieval; D020407:Internet; D011786:Quality Control; D011873:Radiology Information Systems / Q000295:instrumentation / Q000458:organization & administration; D018511:Systems Integration; D019112:Teleradiology; D016526:Workload