Did you know that Perth is considered the most remote major city in the world? It is antipodal relative to my home in South Carolina, and it is exactly 12 hours ahead. Thus, I'm more or less as far from home as I can get and remain on Earth. But you wouldn't know it by walking around. Perth is a really nice place, very cosmopolitan.
After doing a bit of shopping in a wonderful European-style promanade, I've been wandering the exhibit floor at RANZCR. The iPad is the temptation of choice around here, with many vendors offering one up as a prize if you are so kind as to fill out the contact information. Not a problem, although I doubt I'll be contacted, being rather far from the local market. I'll let you know if I actually win an iPad.
One such drawing is run by Contrast Imaging Solutions, and I stopped to have a very interesting chat with the guys there. It seems they have GE to thank for their existence: someone here using iPACS was abandonded when GE bought the company (RealTimeImage) and assimilated the product. The CI folks got together and built a new RIS/PACS from scratch. I gave it a very cursory look and it does seem to have promise. There are no plans, though, to export it to the 'States as its billing module is geared toward the Australian payers.
As part of their iPad drawing entry, I had to write down the RIS and PACS I'm using, and its best and worst features. For my Empiric RIS and AMICAS PACS, I gave credit for usability. For the downside, I noted the fact that Fuji now owns Empiric. (I'm hoping that Merge's ownership of AMICAS turns out to be a positive.)
CI's unofficial talley of the poll so far notes mostly negative sentiments. There was apparently a pleurality of responses like, "the best part of our system is logging off," and "too many crashes." I'm not sure there were even any positive answers beyond mine.
Vendors, listen to your customers. No, not the IT folks, or whatever. Listen to the radiologists who actually use your stuff. They don't like a lot of what you are doing. It's not too much for us to ask for a system that works, and works well, especially at the prices these things command.
There are companies that understand that. From my brief chat, Contrast Imaging is one of them. And I'm sure there are many more. Wouldn't you rather be known as a vendor that "GETS IT" than otherwise? Seriously?
1 comment :
Welcome to Perth Dr Dalai, I hope you make "Dalai’s Laws of PACS – Revised" available to those of us who cant make the conference and are entertaining the Vikings instead.
In return we will turn on the sunset generator for you , oh.. its best viewed from the edge of the Indian ocean . :-)
Post a Comment