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In a small group interview, Eduardo Ventura, St. Luke’s Medical
Center administrator for Picture Archiving and Communications System
or PACS, discussed how PACS has helped hospital improve its
customers’ satisfaction.
PACS is a system allowing patient’s
examination images stored or archived and retrieved in computers or
networks equipped with Diagnostic X-ray, Ultrasound, Computed
Tomography (CT), Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI), Nuclear Medicine
and Cardiac Catheterization Lab. The images are usually stored in an
independent format and the most common format is the Digital Imaging
and Communications in Medicine , a standard format for handling,
storing and transmitting information in medical imaging.
“PACS is a technology advance system that
employed innovative hardware, integrating input to decrease
archive,” Ventura said. “We are actually the pioneering service
technology.”
Ventura said this digital technology has become
a big advantage to their medical practitioners for it provides them
with the ability to come up an earlier and more accurate diagnosis
of their patients. It also enables physicians to easily access the
patient’s information in any locations, at home or at the
hospital.
It has two servers with a capacity of one
terabyte each.
According to Ventura, among the benefits of
having PACS technology include: providing doctors with easy access
to the patient’s examination; allowing a doctor to manipulate the
images on his own computer and; reducing the films and related costs
of the hospital.
PACS, with almost 1,000 medical practitioner
users, started its operation in September 1998 with MRI and CT scan.
-- Cris-Ann G. Odronia
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