Communication is a simple word that has many meanings. We all need to communicate to share, work and play. In our new technology world, we now communicate with our fingers - email, text, etc. And what is Tweeting?
Integration is the connection of communications. Our computers communicate through integration. In the veterinary practice, we have many forms of communication including the share of information among computers. Other words used include interface, interconnect, and network. Every year we see more computer related communication and integration from more types of computers doing more work for us. Even an ultrasound machine is now a computer.
We often get the question asked "Does Metron communicate with my other software programs?" Of course, Metron does communicate but the devil is in the details. The details include the method of communication and the specific information that both programs need to share.
One of the hottest communications/integration topics is "DICOM and the Patient Medical" Record. It is becoming popular to have access to diagnostic images from the patient record. DICOM is the method of communications and store of diagnostic images and the patient medical record is a convenient place to access historical images.
Storing and viewing diagnostic images - two schools of thought. One school of thought is to store all patient information in the patient medical record. Once in the patient record, all diagnostic images can then be viewed diagnostically and presented to pet owners on exam room workstations. Not a bad way to go but causes the database to grow 10x as fast as it was before adding diagnostic images.
The second school of thought is to keep the diagnostic images stored on the source imaging systems (including PACS, if you have one) for diagnostic viewing and only send images to other computers when the need arises. Usually the systems producing the images are also the best at displaying the images for diagnostic interpretation. With this second approach, your practice is ready for a variety of emerging options for viewing and presenting diagnostic images.
Metron can send to an iPad and iPhone, web browser viewing programs, can email to anyone in a snap, burn to a CD or DVD, and can backup to external hard drives directly connected or across the network. You can still send some of your images to the patient record - just do it when you want immediate access to those specific images from the patient record.
Already we are seeing the "Cloud" play a factor in choosing how you want to share and view diagnostic images. The "Cloud" which is a combination of the internet communication, integration, and storage makes it very easy for anyone to send and share with anyone else. The Metron iPad, iPhone and web viewer programs are "Cloud" based.
We know you have a lot of communications and integration options to sort through. Most important, identify value and efficiency. The whole point of using computers is to make you more efficient while increasing your quality of delivery. Your approach to diagnostic imaging communication and integration needs to serve you. Sometimes more is not always better.
Visit the "DICOM" and "Managing" pages on our support website to find out more about how Metron communicates and integrates.
Dr. Mecham spends 85% of his time teaching senior OSU students equine ambulatory work, including field radiology. "With Metron being so easy to use, my students (and colleagues) were able to start taking x-rays after one demonstration. The comfort level, ease of use and overall reliability is far superior to any other imaging software I have used." In addition, Dr. Mecham comments on how good the image quality is for diagnostics evaluation. The feature that he has also come to really appreciate, since starting to use Metron is the ability to continually feed film after film without having to tell the software you are taking another shot.
