WWW-based access to radiological patient data: two years of experience.
This paper describes the theoretical concept behind, the technical implementation of, and the experiences created with a self-developed system to access radiological patient data by WWW-technology.


METHODS
The WWW-system interfaces the RIS via HL7 and the PACS via DICOM. Core components are a secure Web-Server and an underlying database system (DB). The DB contains all relevant information from the RIS and thumbnails of corresponding images archived in the PACS. After authorization, the user receives this information in the form of dynamically generated Web pages. By mouse-clicking a thumbnail, the original DICOM-image is sent. It is displayed with a helper application (DICOM-Viewer), allowing all kinds of image manipulation and post-processing.


RESULTS
Determined advantages of the system were: platform independence, security features, a fixed link of image and report, universal availability, and simple usage. The only critical issue was performance. Cost savings could be seen in: a reduction of DICOM workstations, employment of all available hardware, and reduced training and teaching efforts.


CONCLUSIONS
The author believes that a WWW-based concept is the only feasible approach which is in the same way technically possible, clinically acceptable, and financially affordable in order to grant a variety of users access to radiological data--although improvements in performance have to made by, e.g., closer implementation of those systems to the RIS and PACS architecture, and by employing high-grade image compression.
Bergh
B
B
Dept. of Information and Data Processing, Medical Centre of the Johann Wolfgang Goethe-University, Frankfurt am Main, Germany.
Felix
R
R
D004867:Equipment Design; D005858:Germany; D006801:Humans; D020407:Internet; D011873:Radiology Information Systems / Q000191:economics / Q000295:instrumentation; D019114:Remote Consultation / Q000191:economics / Q000295:instrumentation