By Kathleen Acuff

The exchange of radiology information at El Camino Hospital will become more efficient, and associated images more accessible, when installation of a digital radiology information system and image archive is completed next September.

The Siemens Radiology Information System and Picture Archive Computer System will allow physicians to view and discuss patients’ medical images simultaneously from different sites in the hospital.

Chief Information Officer Mark Zielazinski said the capability “ultimately” would extend “to the homes of physicians and patients.” This year’s budget includes $2 million for all costs associated with the two systems. Installation is scheduled to begin in January.

Chief of Staff Dr. Ken Vereschagin said the systems will “enhance the debate greatly” when doctors confer on patient care.

The current radiology information system is 15 years old and last received a major upgrade in 1998, according to CEO Lee Domanico’s written recommendation to the hospital board of directors.

The information system schedules and tracks patients through the radiology department and stores clinical and financial data. The digital image archive will enable the hospital to store digital scans, such as those produced by magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), and transmit them to emergency and operating rooms, physicians’ offices and other sites in the hospital.

Zielazinski said “read” stations connected to the image server will replace light boxes in such areas as operating rooms.

“Surgery is headed toward robotic control, and images will be a key part of that,” he added.

The hospital building now under construction has been designed for digital radiology and not for storing film. Hospitals are required by law to keep medical film for seven years, but “at some point downstream, we’ll have no film,” Zielazinski said.

The hospital stores its digital information onsite but also maintains mirrored systems in southern California - “in a seismically stable area far east of Los Angeles,” he said.