Comparison of worldwide opinions on the costs and benefits of PACS

Elisabeth M.S.J. van Gennip; Bas M. van Poppel; Albert Reinder Bakker; Fenno P. Ottes

doi:10.1117/12.45303

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1 July 1991 Comparison of worldwide opinions on the costs and benefits of PACS

Elisabeth M.S.J. van Gennip, Bas M. van Poppel, Albert Reinder Bakker, Fenno P. Ottes

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Proceedings Volume 1446, Medical Imaging V: PACS Design and Evaluation; (1991) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.45303
Event: Medical Imaging '91, 1991, San Jose, CA, United States

Abstract

As PACS mature and their integration in hospitals can be expected in the not too distant future, insight into the costs and benefits of these systems is needed. A major problem in the assessment of the costs and benefits of PACS is the lack of international consensus on, e.g., the functional requirements of PACS, on the costs of some major components of the system, and on the impact of the implementation of PACS in a hospital on logistics and patient care. The authors have developed and distributed the software package, CAPACITY, which supports cost and benefit analyses and facilitates the exchange of data. This paper presents an overview of some opinions on the costs and benefits of PACS. It is based on literature data and on data which have been assembled through CAPACITY. Most experts agree that a hospital-wide PACS is more expensive than film, at least now, but the opinions on the costs and the required functionality of PACS components show a wide variation. The costs of PACS however must be weighed against their benefits. PACS has the potential of improving the hospital logistics and patient care. More quantified data on the effect of PACS on, e.g., the availability of images and on the length of patient stay is needed.

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Elisabeth M.S.J. van Gennip, Bas M. van Poppel, Albert Reinder Bakker, and Fenno P. Ottes "Comparison of worldwide opinions on the costs and benefits of PACS", Proc. SPIE 1446, Medical Imaging V: PACS Design and Evaluation, (1 July 1991); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.45303

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