ABSTRACT
The VA has developed an integrated infrastructure to support the exchange of medical data, including images and text report data, between medical centers. This capability is expected to support teleconsulting and meet a variety of existing medical staffing and consultation needs. Consultation from distant locations requires at least the same complete integrated patient record available to onsite physicians. Several mechanisms are being explored to support distant medical consultation. Multimedia extensions to the VA's electronic mail system have been developed to allow images and other data objects to be included in electronic mail messages. Another approach that has been prototyped is to extend existing local imaging networks to produce more widely distributed imaging systems. These approaches will be described and discussed.
Subject(s)
Computer Communication Networks , Office Automation , Telemedicine , Hospital Information Systems , Humans , Image Processing, Computer-Assisted , Local Area Networks , Medical Records Systems, Computerized , United States , United States Department of Veterans AffairsABSTRACT
The DHCP Integrated Imaging System provides users with integrated patient data including text, image and graphics data. This system has been transferred from its original two screen DOS-based MUMPS platform to an X window workstation and a Microsoft Windows-based workstation. There are differences between these various platforms that impact on software design and on software development strategy. Data structures and conventions were used to isolate hardware, operating system, imaging software, and user-interface differences between platforms in the implementation of functionality for text and image display and interaction. The use of an object-oriented approach greatly increased system portability.
