Cardiac PACS — A digital system for real time cardiac image visualization and management

A for real time synchronous digital recording, visualization and archiving of still and full motion cardiac images and audio data from ultrasound imaging systems has been developed. The echocardiographic video signals in RGB or PAL/NTSC format are digitized at a rate of 30 frames per second and compressed in real time down to 250 KB/second bit stream. The video images are recorded synchronously with electrocardiogram resulting in a sequence of time segments corresponding to the duration of heart beats. A real time synchronous serial comparison of recorded cardiac image data with live images is also provided. The visualization functions provide an instant access to selected image sequences, cine´ loops and still images displayed on the screen of an ultrasound machine in a user desired format such as split, quad or hex screen display.