Intelligent image management in a distributed PACS and telemedicine environment

Advances in information technology in the past decade have resulted in a proliferation of clinical information systems dedicated to individual user groups and clinical functional areas. This, in turn, has led to the need for hospital-wide management and integration of information, and has triggered major efforts towards the development of integrated hospital information systems. A framework for developing an integrated regional health telematics system is presented, based on the functional and data integration of federated autonomous information systems. The concept of the patient meta-record is introduced as a central element in achieving integration in terms of content, structure, and access to information resources. Intelligent image management at the level of either a single health care provider (hospital) or a regional health telematics network is addressed and is achieved through event and model-driven strategies enabled by a distributed hierarchical storage management system. Intelligence, in this context, refers to methods of efficient and effective real-time resource management in the timely delivery of health care