E-Health Image Exchange Service Developed to Automate Community-Wide Access of Radiology Studies

A new e-health image exchange service utilizes a unique approach to sharing images that simplifies information technology (IT) deployment, keeps ownership of imaging with the radiology providers, and is more cost-effective than a centralized deployment.

EHealth Global Technologies (eHGT; Rochester, NY, USA) reported that Rochester RHIO (Rochester, NY, USA), a New York state regional health information organization (RHIO), implemented the company's eHealthConnect Image Exchange service to automate access to patient images across the participating healthcare institutions. The service integrates with Rochester RHIO's Axolotl Corp.'s (San Jose, CA, USA) Elysium health information exchange (HIE) system and connects to the picture archiving and communication systems (PACS) imaging services at eight radiology providers. Lakeside Memorial Hospital (Brockport, NY, USA) is the first health provider integrated into the eHealthConnect Image Exchange.

"Early on in the RHIO development, we recognized the importance of including imaging as an integral part of shared patient data across the Greater Rochester region to provide improved patient-centric care," noted Ted Kremer, executive director of the Rochester RHIO. "The Image Exchange from eHealth Global will improve access to patient images, including CT [computed tomography], MRI [magnetic resonance imaging], X-ray, and ultrasound exams; it will reduce duplicate procedures, which add unnecessary healthcare costs and exposure to radiation; and it will reduce the associated costs of managing and distributing that data across the region."

In addition to automating access to images, the Image Exchange will cache 30 days of exams as well as providing the ability to pull older exams on-demand. EHGT's eHealthViewer, a single viewer with full diagnostic quality viewing, image processing, and measurements, will be used by clinicians to view the radiology exams selected from within the web-based Elysium HIE system.

"We are excited to be at the forefront of implementing an image exchange that allows us to share images with all participating clinicians throughout the Rochester RHIO," said John Schrenker, chief information officer of Lakeside Health System. "Providers connected to the Rochester RHIO can now enhance their referral process with Lakeside Health System by being able to access radiology reports and images from Lakeside, immediately upon their availability, regardless of the location of the clinician. As a result, our patients are assured that their care providers will have all the information needed at the point-of-care to either diagnose or provide treatment. The eHealthConnect Image Exchange is a cost-effective method of distributing patient images throughout the community that will also help us raise the standard of care, reduce costs associated with duplicate exams, and lead to a more efficient patient care delivery model."

The Image Exchange servers and data storage are housed in a tier-1, Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act- (HIPAA)-compliant data center, and all information is distributed via a virtual private network (VPN). At each radiology provider site, eHGT deployed an "edge server" that communicates with the provider's PACS via Digital Imaging and Communications in Medicine (DICOM) query/retrieve and does not impact user licenses or Web performance of the PACS. Healthcare standards and web services are fundamental to the architecture.

"This is the first image exchange of its kind image in the country, and as a result it will enable participating facilities and physicians to provide a higher standard of care by ubiquitous sharing of patient images across an entire health care community," said Ken Rosenfeld, president and chief technology officer, eHealth Global. "This level of access to images will help reduce duplicate testing and the risk of mistakes, and enable participating facilities to better utilize radiology resources. Rochester RHIO is a benchmark for RHIOs and HIEs across the country for exchanging of images in a useful and functional manner."

EHGT is a medical record retrieval and electronic delivery service provider. eHGT's services eHealthConnect, eHealthConnect Image Exchange, eHealthConnect for Clinical Trials, and eHealthRetriever help patients, medical centers, clinical departments, communities, and clinical trials organizations improve productivity, reduce waste, and improve patient care. Each service utilizes innovative information technology to retrieve medical records and images of all formats and securely deliver them to healthcare providers or an individual's personal health record. EHGT's clinical customer support team collects and manages patient data regardless of the source and format of the data.

The Rochester RHIO service allows a medical care team to share records across institutions and practices, making patient information available wherever and whenever needed to provide the best care. Patients benefit from fewer repeated tests, easier second opinions, a reduced risk of mistakes caused by poor handwriting or incomplete records, and more informed care during office visits and emergencies.

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eHealth Global Technologies
Rochester RHIO
Axolotl