Health Imaging & IT - September 2008 - (Page 26)

Functional Furniture: Comfort & Convenience in the Reading Room workstation, it would be an arduous process to move a computer and four monitors for each station.” “Radiologists are not your typical computer users. They are very often glued to the screen for long periods of time, and the strain from using a desk that doesn’t conform can cause tremendous stress to one’s body,” Hirschorn says. transitioning toward improvement The radiology department at Mercy Hospital in Chicago converted to a PACS-based environment in August 2005, completely redesigning their reading room environment—which in turn has completely altered workflow for the better, says Peter Jabeck, administrative director of radiology. As a facility that performs about 90,000 imaging exams annually, Mercy has two reading environments: a reading room with five cubicles, plus some of the radiologist’s offices have been furnished with Biomorph reading desks as well. “We redesigned the whole reading room around our new PACS, so the five separate reading desks were all new for us,” Jabeck says. Within the new room, each of the reading areas has sound-proof dividers, its own adjustable table supporting the PACS reading sta- Innovation Confidence Life f Powerful Tools at Your Fingertips At EDDA, we build advanced clinical applications to bring a new generation of interactive decision aid solutions for your needs in early detection, diagnosis and treatment. • Intuitive & efficient • Lesion specific enhancement & analysis • Advanced 3D/4D visualization • Volumetric segmentation, editing & quantification • Enterprise-wide solution for seamless workflow in PACS tion, an adjustable desk, as well as ergonomic chairs. Lights in the reading room have dimmers, allowing individual radiologists or residents to adjust to their personal preference at each desk. Due to the popularity in the reading room, “we also bought the same designs for some of the radiologists’ offices,” Jabeck says. At Mercy, which is staffed by 15 radiologists and five residents, the reading room space is often sought-after and in great demand—so the hospital chose to accommodate certain radiologist’s offices with the same capabilities to expand productivity and comfort there, too. Better reading rooms coupled with PACS have meant better report turn-around time too—which is now down to about 3.3 hours, Jabeck says. “It’s just a lot easier for the radiologists to bring up images—even old images. Prior to the installation, you had to pull the patient’s folder if you wanted to view older images. Now, if the patient has been imaged at Mercy in the past three to three and a half years, we are able to bring those images up on the screen right away, making things a lot quicker and easier for the radiologist,” he explains. The conversion also has made the residents, who do the majority of pre-reads at Mercy, more efficient because they are able to spend less time looking for priors. Biomorph also worked with Mercy to customize the desks according to the desired modality because some modalities often have more residents who need to view images, and thus need larger desks to accommodate more viewers. Also, due to the limited space of the hospital reading room, the company customized the desks, which are either flat to sit against the wall, or curved to fit into the corners. “Compared to the reading environment we came from, this is a huge improvement, and the cubicles are always full,” Jabeck concludes. new methods, better results The VA Maryland Health Care System in Baltimore has long been the poster-kid for innovative reading rooms. Their 532-square-foot reading room that was renovated a year and a half ago is divided into five separate reading areas as a combination of clinical space, showcase and laboratory. The facility, which performs approximately 90,000 imaging procedures annually, is continuously researching reading room design and ergonomics, including lighting, acoustics and the impact of other modifications, says Eliot Siegel, MD, chief of imaging at the VA Maryland Healthcare System, professor and vice-chair of radiology at the University of Maryland Medical School in Baltimore. “Each of the five rooms, which are about 10 x 10 feet, utilize different furniture, lighting and ergonomic solutions,” Siegel explains. The rooms were created along with four different vendors: Anthro Corporation, Xybix Systems, Details/Steelcase, and RedRick/Evolve Technologies. Why not standardize on one solution? Then you don’t know what works best. Despite the physical differences of each of the workstations and desks, there is some continuity throughout the room because they all share one common space. 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Health Imaging & IT - September 2008 Table of Contents On the Web The Enterprise News Update Imaging Weighs the Evidence Radiation Oncology Tackles IT Integration PET/CT: Diagnosing Cardiac Disease—Adding Function to Form Modality Update People & Technology In Practice Reader's Resource Technology Outlook

Health Imaging & IT - September 2008

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