Issue Month: January, 2013
Publication: Color Doppler
India is one of the fastest growing medical imaging markets, thanks to the diagnostic imaging showing a gradual shift from analogue systems to digital systems. Corporate hospitals have been instrumental in promoting world class health Information Technology (IT) which has benefited them immensely; in terms of providing excellent healthcare along with minimizing the administrative and clerical work.
But, it is the Government hospitals, which have a lot of catching up to do. The current trend is inching towards a system with quarantined health networks that are becoming powerhouses of precious health information. This gap between the private and the Government sector is only getting obvious with the private firms coming up with various business models to bridge the gaps.
With over a century gone, since the discovery x-ray, it is, now, the era in which images are stored, archived, retrieved and displayed digitally.
The technology in use currently is the Picture Archival and Communication System (PACS), which provides for storage and access to images from multiple modalities.
PACS with the assistance of a secured network and the emerging web technology nullifies the various barriers, other wise related to conventional film based image retrieval and display.
With the healthcare segment moving towards digitalization, there is a lot to expect from the stable of Srishti. We are working towards attaining unmatched efficiency in our ‘Integration engine’ and ‘Enterprise Service Bus’ which are used to communicate with third party software. This efficiency will enable boundless integration with any third party software.
The coming days will see remarkable advancement in the way images are stored in PACS. With radiologists and physicians becoming increasingly reliant on the use of sophisticated imaging modalities; with the image sizes per procedure ranging from 10 MB to 90 MB, the strain on PACS is getting evident. The effect of this has led to the advancement in this sector – holographic storage and retrieval technologies.
The key advantage of this is that the amount of data that can be stored is exponentially higher than any existing storage mechanisms currently being used.
This is being achieved by storing the data on a 3D holographic media as opposed to the traditional surface based media storage. It won’t be long before we see holographic storage technology replacing the magnetic, single layer optical storage technology. If implemented in the right way, these IT systems possess mechanisms to reduce administrative and clerical work, thereby sparing more time for patient care, lowering down defect rate and at same time raising levels in storage and transmission of data. With the above mentioned positives and benefits of Medical IT, the present, seems to be the right time to devise a National Health Information Technology Policy which would result in standardized adoption and use of the healthcare T across the country.
However, sadly,healthcare IT does not play a major role in the road map for Indian healthcare. Few expectations from the Government would be:
• Standardized healthcare IT implementation policy
• Provisioning of required infrastructure
• Planned architecture for data transmission and integrity that would enable seamless flow of information
• Tax benefits/ reimbursement schemes/ incentives for usage of ICT in healthcare e.g. replacing conventional films with digital storage in medical imaging which has great environmental benefits
• Creating awareness among the health personnel.
Srishti is working on various advancements and futuristic technologies that will help us to have the cutting edge over our competitors.
We are focused on developing models that will contribute towards improving the quality of healthcare offered to patients. We are working on various advancements and futuristic technologies that will help us to have the cutting edge over our competitors. We are focused on developing models that will contribute towards improving the quality of health care offered to patients.
