Health Imaging & IT - December 2008 - (Page 14)

Technology At Work: What You Need to Compete storage challenge delivers multiple benefits from enhanced service to improved disaster recovery. Sheer necessity often drives sites to the data storage drawing board. Take for example Cancer Treatment Centers of America (CTCA) of Chicago. Three years ago, the enterprise started to transition from best-of-breed applications to a platform-based approach. The change in strategic direction provided an opportunity to fix the ailing storage environment, says CIO Chad Eckes. “The move to 100 percent electronic clinical documentation brought our dependence on data to light,” recalls Eckes. CTCA’s first-generation directattached system offered minimal control over storage, and the tape backup process represented a cumbersome burden on IT staff. In 2007, CTCA invested in EMC Corporation Clariion SAN and an offsite data center, duplicating data every 15 minutes. A July 2008 upgrade to real-time replication provides additional security; however, the center maintains a multi-pronged approach to ensure 99.999 percent availability. The top level clusters and mirrors the production system, followed by live duplication at the data center. Next, disks are backed up on EMC Disk Library and final backups are on tape. Using strategy facilitates redundancy. Critical applications are split between data centers at two separate campuses and HP Continuous Access replicates data for additional security, says Dave VanDerHeyden, storage director. Advanced visualization across the enterprise “We should be leveraging advanced visualization as a next-generation PACS application,” opines Rasu Shrestha, MD, medical director of digital imaging informatics at University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (UPMC). The rationale is simple. Sixty-four slice CT is nearly ubiquitous. Consequently, radiologists are inundated with data with some scans generating nearly 10,000 images per study. Radiologists need to leverage every pixel of data to make the most informed diagnostic decisions. That’s where advanced visualization plays a starring role. “The only way to leverage new imaging technologies and modalities is to post-process slices into 3D datasets,” states Shrestha. UPMC stands at the leading edge of enterprise advanced visualization. Like many large academic medical centers, UPMC uses an array of 3D solutions. Vital Images VitalConnect smart-client enterprise system is the hub of the center’s next-generation undertaking. Conventional 3D workflow can be inconsistent. That is, the radiologists’ efficiency hinges on the tech’s ability to appropriately route studies to the correct 3D workstation. If the tech does not push the data to the right workstation, the radiologist is stuck in manual query/retrieve process that hampers workflow. “Studies need to be consistently consistent,” says Shrestha. VitalConnect’s centralized server approach removes the inconsistency by intelligently routing studies to the appropriate point of care. Like PACS, advanced visualization also runs a hefty (and growing) business outside the radiology department borders. “Smartclient is a paradigm shift in image delivery,” shares Shrestha. Prior to VitalConnect, radiologists maintained sole control of 3D data. They post-processed the images; typically selecting one or two snapshots to share with referring clinicians in the final report. VitalConnect completes the loop by sharing images and toolsets with referring physicians. Snapshots carry 3D functionality, which means clinicians can manipulate datasets as needed at their desktop. “It’s a tremendous value to cardiologists and other specialists like oncologists, surgeons and orthopedic specialists,” explains Shrestha. “Smart-client [advanced visualization] is a paradigm shift in image delivery…It’s a tremendous value to cardiologists and other specialists like oncologists, surgeons and orthopedic specialists.” Rasu Shrestha, MD, medical director of digital imaging informatics, University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (UPMC) multiple layers with different types of technology provides optimum insurance and recovery speed while keeping costs low. Another critical advantage comes on the operations front as the SAN approach allows CTCA to manage a rapidly growing storage environment with minimal staff. “If we had continued to operate our previous storage system we would have needed to double staff from two to four FTEs,” says Eckes. The benefit that matters most, however, is service. “The major benefit of this approach is insurance,” states Eckes. “It helps us keep our promise to our patients [by ensuring rapid access to clinical data].” Storage is a unique project for each enterprise. Applications should drive the storage strategy; that is, storage is designed around clinical needs. Like CTCA, Genesis Health System, a four-hospital health system in Davenport, Iowa, started migrating to SAN after upgrading clinical systems. The storage system combines HewlettPackard EVA SAN with an HP NAS for medical archiving and document imaging. Cardiology and radiology data are consolidated on the SAN for six to 12 months of short-term storage with a Sun ASM providing the long-term archive. A divide-and-conquer 14 Health Imaging & IT | December 2008 Beyond 2008 The economic writing is on the wall. Hospitals and imaging centers will need to squeeze every drop of efficiency out of technology investments and human resources as possible. They need to boost service to referring physicians and patients to maintain a competitive edge. They need to build knowledge and best practices to enable better care and reduced costs. Well-deployed imaging and IT technology helps address the problem—cutting costs, improving service and enabling adopters to do more with stable or dwindling resources and effectively compete in the marketplace. HealthImaging.com http://www.HealthImaging.com

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Health Imaging & IT - December 2008

Health Imaging & IT - December 2008 Table of Contents The Enterprise News Update Technology at Work: What You Need to Compete Why 1.5T MRI is Leading the Pack Workflow Strategies Aid Advanced Visualization Deployment Illuminating Reading Room Design for Better Reading Strategies Cardiac SPECT Sharpens its Focus OrthoPACS: The Information Backbone of the Orthopedic Clinic Imaging Tools Reader's Resource

Health Imaging & IT - December 2008

For optimal viewing of this digital publication, please enable JavaScript and then refresh the page. If you would like to try to load the digital publication without using Flash Player detection, please click here.