Veterinary offices rely on Vet PACS to help them make the most of their digital medical imaging systems. Digital imagers take images and translate them into the dicom format, which is a medical digital imaging format similar to jpeg. Once digital images are in the dicom format, they can then be sent, received, viewed or archived through the use of a PACS system, a software and hardware unit that runs on a personal computer. With this digital imaging equipment in place, you will spend less time on routine tasks and have a more efficient veterinary clinic.
The Vet digital X-ray system begins with the image capture unit, and this may be either a Vet CR or Vet DR unit. A Vet DR system takes the highest resolution digital medical images on the market today, and may be used in a mobile imaging system as well. Vet CR systems are less expensive than DR systems, and they enable you to retrofit your current film imaging hardware so that it will be able to also take digital images. CR systems also work very well in a mobile environment, with wheeled hand carts offering the ability to move them around quickly and easily.
Once your digital Vet x-ray imaging device has taken an image, it can then be sent to your workstation that runs the PACS system. The PACS workstation will allow you to manipulate the digital medical images so that you can change the brightness, contrast, zoom or highlight aspects of the digital image to get a clearer view, which leads to better patient care as well. If the workstation has Internet service, you can also email digital medical images to colleagues for consultations, unlike film images that would need to be sent through traditional mail. Dicom images may be circulated via a secure local area network, wide area network or virtual private network. After the initial viewing digital medical images may be stored in a variety of ways. You can immediately make copies on a CD or DVD at your workstation, or you can send digital images to a secure server for archiving.
A PACS system can also be used in conjunction with a RIS system. This allows documents like reports to be available in dicom format, so that digital images and digital documents can be seen together at your workstation, or can be transmitted or stored at your discretion. By going digital, veterinary offices can reach a new level of workflow efficiency.
Jonathon Blocker writes about--Vet PACS and Vet Digital X-ray.