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PACS Workflow Efficiency Increases With VNA

There is a reason why the vendor neutral archiving (VNA) market is expected to top a billion dollars by 2018 – healthcare professionals are looking to gain efficiencies outside of what they can get in their PACS, and VNA is the answer.

The days of the proprietary storage architecture bounding up the PACS workflow are coming to an end, maybe not as fast as some providers would hope, but the answer is increasingly being found in the cloud. In fact, some experts in the medical IT field predict that by 2020, the VNA market will actually surpass the PACS market share.

First and foremost, healthcare professionals working with medical imaging are finding that enterprise image management solutions in the cloud are assisting them in unlocking disparate PACS archive silos and helping to consolidate patient data. The process is relatively simple when it comes to sharing and accessing medical images across the enterprise.

Providers must also consider as they seek out a VNA solution that there are actually many definitions of VNA, which has prompted the term “true” VNA to help weed out the pretenders. True VNA means you’re getting a solution that can store the complete suite of DICOM SOP classes. It can also store ALL objects in a non-proprietary format, which is where some vendors who offer “VNA” are falling short. Furthermore, true VNA supports the most inclusive DICOM query/retrieve specification as a service provider for the information stored in the archive.

Healthcare professionals today are seeking out archives without boundaries. They know that in this age of data increasing by the terabyte, scalability is what really counts. This is why they’re relying less on on-site servers and partnering with a vendor that has access to multiple datacenters where the storage capabilities are virtually limitless.

The best VNA providers are those that offer services that require the client to have a modern web browser, which enables them to access medical imaging data anywhere and without interference from the vendor. However, all patient data must be secure, so there shouldn’t be any clinical data downloaded by anyone who gets access to the data, such as a specialist working alongside the primary care physician.

Some healthcare facilities are using multiple viewers in order to see the medical images stored on PACS from different vendors. However, with VNA, all that is required is a universal viewer, which could be a desktop monitor, laptop, tablet computer or smartphone. This is the ultimate in portability and availability for healthcare providers on the go and radiologists who need access to medical images to quickly and easily report their findings.

OffSite Image Management, Inc. has emerged as a leader in offering cloud-based VNA technology. Our solutions are available to healthcare providers big and small, but we are especially attractive to critical care facilities that have limited resources because our solutions are scalable and affordable, even for the most rural facility. Contact us today and let’s discuss your PACS and your needs.