The Benefits of Cloud PACS
It wasn’t long ago that when it came to shopping around for a PACS solution, your options were limited to fairly expensive to really expensive solutions – and nothing in between. Fortunately, cloud technology is expanding, giving cloud PACS the ability to offer a new and efficient way of meeting medical image management needs.
As a professional who works with medical imaging, you know how important it is for you to have on-demand access to all the diagnostic studies you need through the course of a typical workday. It doesn’t matter if you’re a radiologist, an emergency room physician, oncologist, cardiologist or a healthcare IT professional – being connected to fast, vendor neutral solutions is paramount to the success of your facility.
For nearly two decades the traditional, on-premise PACS, was the end-all be-all of image management. While these PACS worked extremely well within the department they served, they couldn’t and can’t live up to what medical professionals are trying to achieve today. Namely, it’s in the disaster recovery and ability to share with other departments or facilities where the downfall is most prevalent. This is where cloud PACS comes in to offer an answer to the question about where image management can improve.
You’re probably using software-as-a-service (SaaS) solutions in some form or another. Cloud PACS works exactly the same way. However, cloud PACS offer a multitude of perks that keep IT staff happy and healthcare professionals delivering their best possible care, and it has to do with more than just cost savings.
Choosing a vendor to handle your images offsite allows you to take advantage of many services, but only if you go with the right vendor. The right vendor will offer true vendor neutral archiving technology, which means you’ll be able to access your data regardless of your viewer or your browser. Your IT department benefits because all maintenance and upgrades are provided by the vendor, leaving your IT staff to manage your current onsite systems.
One of the biggest perks to going with cloud PACS is that the best vendors will offer disaster recovery solutions that will give you a 99 percent uptime and little to no worry about having your data compromised, regardless of what natural disasters befall your region.
Bringing a cloud PACS solution into the mix means your IT department no longer has to configure networks and VPNs. Gone are the days when your healthcare professionals struggled to share data with other departments and other facilities. Data can be called up through queries and shared through a secure URL.
OffSite Image Management, Inc., has developed VNA solutions with disaster recovery protocols through the cloud. Our clients only pay for what they use, which means they aren’t stuck with an expensive image management solution that they hardly use. Rural providers that can’t afford a new PACS are taking advantage of the perks they gain through OffSite, as are larger hospitals that want to get connected through Health Image Exchanges that OffSite also provides. Contact us today and we’ll discuss how we can assist you.