Wednesday, 10 September, 1997 08:32
Well, it finally happened. I had a fun night at work last night.
And it wasn't because I didn't have to do any work, either. I had to work plenty hard, let me tell you.
But I had a new toy to play with...
Before the DR (Digital Radiography) I would make an exposure, put the film in a processor and develop it. Took about 90 seconds to get the film out. Pretty quick, huh?
Now, I expose the cassette (which does not use film) and I put it in a digital processor, which reads an imaging device inside the cassette and sends it to a 386 board. Then we have an image file which is about two megs; 2000 by 1800 pixels with 32-bit resolution. I get a quick view of the exposure on a small monitor, which is good enough to tell me if the exposure is going to be adequate. Then the ER doc can look at it (and manipulate it) on a 23-inch mono monitor. Besides fiddling with the orientation, density and contrast, edge enhancement can be used; and the resolution of the edge enhancement can be changed, depending on what kind of structure you're looking at.
About 800 images can be stored on the ED unit, and 1600 on the one in the main department. Right now, they're not fully interconnected, but they will be shortly.
This is just the tip of the PACS system; eventually, all images will be immediately available anywhere in the hospital.
Is that cool or what?
Our digital radiography finally got set up in our Emergency Department. I got inserviced on it this morning, after I had been using it all night. It's really ... cool... I guess is the best way to say it.