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Excerpt

Introduction to Medical Imaging

Long before there were X-rays, computed tomography (CT) scans, magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), and many other imaging techniques, healthcare workers had no way of viewing the insides of their patients’ bodies. They had to rely only on their clinical skills to diagnose illnesses and monitor disease progression.

All of this changed with the discovery of medical imaging, which refers to the process of visualizing the interior of a body without using a surgical procedure. The purpose of this is to aid in the clinical analysis of the person or animal that the imaging is being done for and possibly improve the medical intervention that will be offered. It enables physicians and vets to view the internal organs and tissues that are usually hidden behind skin and bones, making it easier to detect when things have deviated from normal. This makes the processes of diagnosing and treating certain diseases much more straightforward than before these imaging techniques were created.

Evolution of Imaging Modalities 

The first medical imaging modality to be discovered was the X-ray. It was discovered in 1895 by a German physicist named Wilhelm Conrad Roentgen. Like many of the discoveries made in those days, he discovered the X-rays accidentally while performing different experiments. In fact, the “x” in the name was due to the unknown nature of the rays at that time. It was not until many years later that scientists discovered the nature of the rays, their association with ionizing radiation, and their harmful side effects.

Today, much more is understood about X-rays, and scientists and radiologists have come up with ways to reduce and prevent the harmful side effects while still allowing them to be used. In some places, X-rays are referred to as radiographs.

Following the discovery of X-rays, other imaging modalities were discovered. In the 1920s, fluoroscopy was discovered. A couple decades after that, in the 1940s, X-ray tomography (the forerunner of CT) was discovered. The 1950s saw the advent of ultrasound scans, angiography, and nuclear medical imaging modalities. CT was discovered in the 1970s, and MRIs were discovered in the 1980s.

All these different modalities have different functions and specific situations that they are best suited for. Some are ideal for viewing bones, while others are better for viewing certain types of tissue injuries. 

Types of Imaging Modalities 

There are two major groups of imaging modalities, and they differ by the kind of radiation that they produce, which is determined by the amount of energy that they produce and their position along the electromagnetic spectrum.

Ionizing radiation

The first group is those that produce ionizing radiation, like X-rays. This means they can alter some of the molecules in the body cells. They exist on the higher energy end of the electromagnetic spectrum. Prolonged exposure to this may cause damage to the skin or tissue and can even cause different kinds of cancer. Examples of medical imaging modalities that make use of ionizing radiation include CT scans, positron emission tomography scans, fluoroscopy, and nuclear medicine procedures.

Non-ionizing radiation

As a result of the side effects associated with ionizing radiation, newer imaging modalities that do not use ionizing radiation have been developed. These non-ionizing radiation methods exist in the lower energy range of the electromagnetic spectrum. They do not have enough energy to remove or alter the molecules in the body cells, though they are known to produce heat. Examples of medical imaging modalities that make use of this include ultrasound scans and MRIs.

Introduction to Veterinary Diagnostic Imaging 

Veterinary diagnostic imaging is the application of medical diagnostic imaging in veterinary practices. Previously, veterinary doctors had to rely solely on their clinical skills to diagnose and treat their patients. The sensitivity and specificity of these diagnoses were low, and there was the risk that conditions would be undiagnosed, misdiagnosed, or diagnosed too late. With the introduction of imaging, there have been many improvements and breakthroughs in veterinary medicine. In turn, it has resulted in marked improvements in screening, monitoring, and diagnosing diseases in animals. Improving the diagnostic capabilities of veterinary doctors has improved the quality of the treatments that they can offer.

The development of dedicated veterinary diagnostic imaging modalities has been slower than what has typically been seen in human medicine. It is only in the last thirty years that significant improvements have occurred in this area. Prior to this, only traditional X-rays produced on film were available. Now, there are digital X-rays, ultrasound scans, MRIs, laparoscopic methods, nuclear medicine functional imaging, positron emission tomography and single-photon emission computed tomography, and thermography.

In addition to the improvements in diagnostic capabilities, these methods are desirable because they are not invasive, they do not alter or worsen the disease process, and they do not cause any unacceptable discomfort for the animals.

Digital Images

After they were first discovered, X-rays had to be captured on special media called “radiographic films.” Much work went into creating these films, and the X-rays had to be done using specialized processes and in specially designed spaces to make sure the films were properly captured.

In the last twenty years, the use of films has been on a decline, and most X-ray and other radiological imaging studies are now done digitally. 

Advantages of digital images 

There are many benefits of this use of digital images, including: 

• Image protection: One problem with physical films was that they had to be stored under specific conditions to preserve the integrity of the images. Failure to do this would result in the films degrading over time. With digital images, there are no physical copies of the films, so they can be better protected, especially if data safeguards are used. Also, issues such as aging of the images are not encountered with digital copies.
• No need for storage space: Digital images eliminate the need to find space to store the films, and when the images are no longer needed, they can simply be deleted, with no effects on the environment.
• Image modification: Digital images can still be edited or manipulated after being captured. Different software can be used to enhance parts of the images, zoom in or out, or generally just work on the image as needed. This is not possible with conventional films. Additionally, conventional films needed to be developed with special chemicals using special methods in darkrooms to prevent damage to them. With digital images, none of this is necessary.
• Rapid transmission: Digital images can be sent anywhere in the world in a matter of seconds, and if the sending platform is a good one, there will be no difference in the quality of the image being seen by the recipient. Conventional films had to be sent using physical mail or transferred from one place to another so the people who needed to view them had access to them, and this would cause delays in diagnosis or treatment. 

Processing and Storage of Digital Images 

After the images are recorded, it is essential to store them in a way that they can be retrieved for future use. There are different ways of storing images, including:

• Locally in a computer: While this is convenient, it does not allow multiple people to have access to the images at the same time, unless they all have access to the same computer. You have to send the image to each person who wants to use it. Another disadvantage is that if your computer crashes, gets damaged, or has any issues, and there are no backup copies of the images, they may be lost forever.
• On transferable devices: This includes devices such as CDs or flash drives. These devices can be distributed to all those who need access to the images, and they can then copy the images to their own computers or laptops. It allows for more sharing options than images that are stored on a local computer, but it can still be limited, especially when the people who need access to the images are not in the same local environment.
• Remotely: The images could be stored within a cloud or remote server. The advantage of this is that it can be accessed by multiple people with server permission. This is the best and most secure way of storing the images because they are not bound to just one computer or device.

Introduction to Image and Workflow Management Systems 

In modern-day veterinary practices, digital images play an important role, and creating systems that can manage how these images are captured, worked on, stored, and disseminated is a critical part of practice workflow management. Workflow management is the process of identifying, organizing, coordinating, and monitoring tasks or assignments to reach a predetermined goal. Thanks to the technological advancements of the twenty-first century, there is now a variety of software available to help with the creation and automation of workflows. Having the right workflow management software can turn a good office or practice into an amazing one. This is true across every industry, including veterinary. By streamlining the processes within the business and eliminating redundancies, good software can improve the efficiency of veterinary practices in astronomical ways.

As a practice owner or manager, you know that keeping your business operations running smoothly is a major part of your role. You can do this by performing workflow optimization, which improves the organization of an office or practice via processes that reduce costs, improve efficiency, and automate various recurrent tasks. Before beginning this process, though, a thorough assessment of the practice’s needs should be conducted. This will ensure that the implemented interventions will improve existing processes and reduce redundancies in others.

Veterinary workflow optimization is crucial to any practice because it helps create a work environment that is streamlined and hassle-free, reducing chaos and making sure that communication between all relevant parties proceeds smoothly. In the long run, veterinary practice workflow optimization will help reduce the time spent on various daily tasks, reduce costs, improve the efficiency of all the parties that utilize the workflow station, enhance record-keeping, save time, and improve communication between the office manager, specialists, radiologists, referral partners, other facilities, and even clients.

Since image management forms a core part of your practice, much consideration should be put into selecting the right image management platform for your practice. This is where a picture archiving and communication system (PACS) becomes essential.

Introduction to the Asteris Keystone PACS

A PACS is an automated system that optimizes the storage, retrieval, and reporting of radiology images, enabling them to be in a digital format that is accessible from multiple locations. Modern PACS can process images from various imaging modalities, including computed tomography, X-ray, magnetic resonance imaging, and ultrasound. These images are stored using a standard file extension called digital imaging and communication in medicine (DICOM) that enables all the files to be stored in a central location. These systems are invaluable for veterinary medical imaging, and they are important for refining and optimizing the workflow in practices. Therefore, selecting an appropriate veterinary PACS software is crucial for any veterinary practice, and much care should be taken during the selection process.

The Asteris Keystone PACS is a complete end-to-end solution software designed specifically for veterinary practices. It is quite beneficial for the process of veterinary workflow optimization because it streamlines radiology-related workflow, enhances the processes of consultation, diagnosing, and reporting, and boosts practice efficiency and productivity. Asteris as a company believes that changing imaging workflows can have a cascading, positive impact on a business, and it seeks to aid veterinary practices in this process with its Keystone PACS. It’s the only veterinary-specific company that has dedicated itself to dealing with all kinds of manufacturers and modalities with the aim of giving its clients maximum flexibility and satisfaction. The suite is fully DICOM-compliant, and the company will work directly with you to accommodate all standard DICOM modalities. It enables data received from DICOM modalities to be processed in a manner that allows for expansion and changes to the DICOM standard, as published by the National Electrical Manufacturers Association. There is also provision for non-DICOM device data to be packaged into DICOM-compliant format and structure.

The Asteris Keystone Software Suite enables the seamless and efficient storage, transfer, retrieval, and reporting of digital images. Changing your imaging workflows can impact the way that you do business. This veterinary PACS software offers improved workflow solutions; greater allowance for the management and processing of images; improved security for data using encryption, hashing, and lossless compression on the cloud-based platform; ample room for collaboration and consultation among all the practice stakeholders; and revolutionary data importing, reporting, monitoring, and sharing capabilities.

Benefits of the Asteris Keystone Suite 

There are numerous benefits associated with using the Asteris Keystone suite as the primary image management system in your practice. These include the following.

Access

It provides effortless storing, accessing, transferring, and sharing of digital images. It has a dedicated online application, and the Asteris Keystone Online app enables you to have remote or mobile access to images, reports, and files from any platform or device, anytime and anywhere.

Image viewing and retrieval

The suite comes with an integrated DICOM image viewer, which enables users to review the images and make diagnoses. The suite also works with other DICOM-compliant image viewers, allowing for better cross-functional integration. It also comes with the ability to perform 2D multi-planar reconstruction, enabling you to easily reconstruct images in multiple planes for greater diagnostic accuracy. 

Ease of transfer and sharing

DICOM and non-DICOM images of any modality can be transferred using the platform, and they can easily be shared with multiple facilities, colleagues, referral partners, and clients for review and interpretation via the Asteris Keystone Community. The patented file packaging method enables you to transfer files across a network on the internet up to three times faster than other PACS, and this requires only half of the storage capacity. Images can be viewed in JPEG format with a web browser or in DICOM format with the free online DICOM viewer.

Seamless integration

The Asteris Keystone PACS has been designed in such a way that it can be integrated into existing diagnostic equipment, radiology information systems, and practice management software. There is no need to completely overhaul your existing system just to install it, which makes it convenient to use. 

Speech-to-text capability

For those who prefer to dictate their notes, the suite has the ability to convert speech to text. 

Report creation

The suite enables you to reduce the time and effort put into creating reports, as it comes with pre-designed report templates and even enables you to create your own templates. 

Scheduling and monitoring

Asteris Keystone can be used to schedule and monitor the status of your radiological examinations with the in-built Modality Worklist/Scheduling feature quickly and easily. This comes with a simple and intuitive user interface. 

Archiving and securing data with the hybrid architecture

The suite provides a means for you to store images locally and off-site. It automatically archives and secures your data in a cloud-based platform. The patented image handling protocol helps you achieve better lossless image compression, faster off-site archival speeds, and more reliable off-site archival than traditional DICOM Send methods. Additionally, it gives you the ability to access and view studies should your practice ever lose internet connectivity. Furthermore, your users will be able to access and view acquired images in real time. This will improve patient care because you will no longer have to wait for studies to archive to the "cloud," as is the case with other cloud-only-based PACS solutions. You can be sure that your stored images will be secured, as Asteris uses encryption, hashing, and lossless compression algorithms to ensure the highest levels of security and data integrity. One fantastic perk with the suite is that the off-site archival of image data for seven years is included in any package that you purchase, at no added cost.

Recovering lost or damaged data

The in-built data recovery mechanisms can help recover your local files speedily if any of them become corrupted or lost.

No service contracts

Asteris operates a simple pay-as-you-use service model, so you do not have to pay any monthly or annual maintenance fees or costly extended service fees. You can customize your plan to fit your business needs and then pay for as little or as much as you use. 

Customizable solutions

Just like the price, this is not a “one-size-fits-all” solution. Asteris will work with you to determine what components of the suite best fit your practice. This will take into consideration factors such as whether you need telemedicine and reporting features, the number of office locations in your practice, and the range of imaging modalities that you will use. 

Service and technical support

Technical support is available to all users twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, all year round. The tech team can address any issues that you might have, without the use of third-party services. This, along with automatic software upgrades, is included as part of your plan at no additional charge. You will also have access to monthly reports detailing archiving activity, including the dates that studies were carried out, the dates they were archived, the names of the patients, their owners, the number of images, and the types of image modalities. 

Teleconsultation workflow

The advanced teleconsultation workflow that comes with the suite enables radiologists, specialists, specialty/referral hospitals, and any other stakeholders to expand their Keystone PACS solution and have a full teleconsultation and reporting platform. This gives referring partners the ability to easily send consultation requests to radiologists and specialists while providing a full reporting platform to the receiving radiologists/specialists.

Easy installation and setup

Depending on the size and features of your system, installation and setup can take as little as thirty minutes. No matter the size, Asteris will be with you every step of the way, and for large and complex system setups, a member of the company’s project management team will work with you to guarantee a successful launch. The software is intuitive and easy to use, so a short training session is usually all that is needed. Additionally, since the solutions are designed to work on non-proprietary hardware, you will not need to buy any new hardware to begin using it. You can utilize it on any platform that you have, such as Windows PC or Mac, and you can use it on any browser. The Keystone PACS can even work with other DICOM-compliant image viewers from other providers. The Application Programming Interface enables you to easily store and retrieve patient data, schedule and track examinations, and display diagnostic images within other veterinary software platforms.

Conclusion 

Diagnostic imaging has led to marked improvements in veterinary medical practices worldwide. Getting an image management system that can optimize stakeholder interactions with these images is crucial because this will markedly improve the workflow and efficiency of your practice.

The Asteris Keystone PACS has numerous components that are guaranteed to make the management of digital images in your practice as seamless and straightforward as possible.

Here at Asteris, it's our goal to help veterinarians make sound medical decisions with ease, clarity, and confidence by giving them the tools and insights that they need to optimize the way they work.
If you're ready to stop feeling like there's not enough time in your day, we can help you optimize your imaging processes and the way you work. Contact our specialists today to get started!

Excerpt

Veterinary Imaging: Business Benefits in Optimization

Introduction

I) Overview of the Market for Veterinary Imaging Solutions

The global market for veterinary imaging equipment is expected to exceed $1.69 billion by the end of 2021 and $2.43 billion by 2025. This growth can be attributed to companies adopting a new normal following the devastating effects of the COVID-19 pandemic that necessitated restrictive containment measures like remote working, social distancing, and reduced commercial activities.

With more pet and livestock owners understanding the importance of veterinary imaging technology, many are actively incorporating veterinary imaging solutions into their operations. With veterinary imaging gaining popularity for purposes other than treating illnesses, the trajectory for the global veterinary imaging equipment market is expected to remain upward. 

Other areas where veterinary imaging solutions have gained popularity include the examination of sporting animals before purchase or for selective breeding purposes and computed tomography (CT) scans to assess meat and fat content levels in livestock.

The surge in pet and livestock populations and their associated diseases is expected to propel the demand for veterinary medical solutions, including veterinary imaging systems that help in diagnosing and assessing treatment outcomes in different animals.

II) Why Is Veterinary Imaging Important in the Veterinary Space?

When you begin navigating the intricate maze of pet care to diagnose a life-threatening ailment or assess the extent of an injury on a pet, you’ll often realize the importance of veterinary radiology.

One of the benefits that veterinary imaging introduces to the veterinary space is the capability to make accurate diagnoses. With veterinary imaging, practitioners can create images of foreign objects, large body cavities, and bones. With the images, veterinary specialists can easily detect deformities, fractures, infections, and injuries. Though radiographs may not provide all the information on the exact cause of a pet’s problem, a veterinarian can use these images to choose the most appropriate tests, thereby improving the accuracy of the diagnostic process. Accurate diagnostics help eliminate inefficiencies and reduce risks associated with excessive exposure. Over time, these translate to better treatment and business outcomes for your veterinary practice.

Assessing treatment effects on target tissues is also a crucial benefit of veterinary imaging. With different radiology features, veterinary practitioners can assess treatment outcomes on fractures, dropsies, neoplasms that cause tumors, anodynes, and much more. Veterinary imaging enables practitioners to view past and present aspects of a patient’s tissues, so they can determine the effectiveness of a treatment plan. With insight into the effectiveness of previous treatment programs, your veterinary practitioners can adjust selected treatment approaches, improving the overall outcomes of the treatment process. Ultimately, the regular evaluation of a treatment path—supported by veterinary imaging’s tissue assessment capabilities—can improve veterinary outcomes in your facility.

Veterinary imaging solutions also help integrate decision support systems into veterinary practices. Leveraging decision support systems can help your veterinary practice gain the benefits of veterinary information systems. For instance, your facility can decrease instances of adverse drug interactions; shorten the period of inpatient stay for pets; improve the content, consistency, and accuracy of veterinary medicine records; reduce variations in your practice; and enhance follow-up processes ensuring continuity in care. Decisions support systems can introduce radiology test ordering capabilities. With radiology test ordering, the decision support systems can help your veterinary practice select appropriate radiologic examinations, eliminate errors in veterinary radiology ordering, and highlight recent or redundant tests. This helps cut costs associated with the erroneous ordering of veterinary imaging processes and the wrongful selection of veterinary radiology examinations, improving your radiology practice’s efficiency.

With veterinary imaging, your facility can leverage picture archiving and communication systems (PACS), reaping the benefits therein. By integrating PACS to improve the performance of your veterinary imaging practice, your facility can reduce its expenditure by replacing local storage and CD costs. It also helps save the time required to burn patient records in CDs. With some PACS being cloud-based, your facility can benefit from having easy access in any location. Veterinary practitioners can access vital patient records via secure platforms, thereby improving convenience for your staff members. 

Furthermore, veterinary imaging supported by cloud-based PACS can help your facility overcome challenges associated with data loss. With regular backups, your facility’s data won’t be affected by hard drive crashes or power outages. The cumulative effects of reduced operation costs, convenient access to patient records, and fewer disruptions associated with data loss give your facility a competitive edge in the veterinary imaging space.

With the importance of veterinary imaging solutions and associated technologies, it’s vital to determine what optimized veterinary PACS are and how they influence veterinary imaging operations. Assessing the significance of optimized veterinary imaging solutions to business outcomes is essential.

Optimized Veterinary PACS and Why They Matter 

Optimized PACS or image management and communication systems are systems developed and tailored for the effective acquisition, storage, retrieval, and sharing of veterinary radiology images and records. Ideally, optimized PACS comprise image generation, distribution, and archiving capabilities. These are integrated with medical and radiology information systems (RIS), helping increase benefits for digital veterinary radiology systems.

With optimized PACS, practitioners in your veterinary radiology practice can enjoy immediate access to images and records, both onsite and remotely. Due to the information stored in the optimized image management solution, veterinary professionals can view different studies simultaneously, regardless of location. This has a profound and positive impact on consultation and collaboration procedures, thereby improving efficiency and treatment accuracy in your practice. 

Optimized PACS can enable your veterinary radiology practice to post-process general radiographs. Previously, enhancements in general radiographs were impossible once general radiographs had been developed. However, the storage of images digitally permits post-processing, helping to compensate for incorrect exposure during radiology procedures. This helps your practice reduce the number of required retests and provides your veterinary radiology specialists with accurate diagnostic information. In turn, this improves treatment outcomes and cuts costs linked to retests in your veterinary practice.

Integrating optimized PACS in your veterinary radiology practice can help your facility leverage digital archives, helping to eliminate lost images. Unlike film or CD-based images, digital images do not leave the archives. Rather, retrieved images are copies of the stored images. This helps prevent loss, essentially protecting your client’s images.

What’s more, optimized PACS can help your specialty leverage images in different modalities. These include CT, magnetic resonance imaging, and digital subtraction angiography. Optimized PACS can help your facility connect with other computerized veterinary radiology solutions, like RIS. These features help your facility access different images and leverage different radiology details to offer accurate diagnoses. This improves the effectiveness of treatment outcomes in your veterinary imaging business.

Optimized PACS can enhance the security of veterinary imaging operations within your facility. By leveraging standards, like digital imaging and communication in medicine (DICOM), optimized PACs can help your facility use acceptable protocols in the interchange of non-proprietary data, adopt accepted digital imaging formats, and document structures. DICOM standards address the management of key areas: imaging procedures, network imaging interpretation, printing images within a network, and offline storage. Therefore, working with an optimized PACS solution that’s adherent to DICOM guidelines can help your veterinary radiology safeguard client records by leveraging suitable data transfer and archiving procedures. 

Working with optimized PACS that adhere to DICOM standards will help your facility leverage automatic interoperability with other veterinary imaging solutions. With standardized storage methods—made possible by DICOM standards—your facility can integrate digital pathology with existent IT solutions, lowering collaboration barriers between disciplines. Ultimately, the benefits from DICOM-compliant PACS can lead to improved cross-discipline communication and improved bottom lines.

What Business Benefits Can Your Veterinary Imaging Service Reap from Optimized PACS Solutions?

With veterinary imaging businesses having varying needs, optimized solutions can help such facilities address their needs accurately. That said, investing in optimized PACS can profoundly benefit your veterinary radiology business. Here are a few benefits that you can expect to reap from these game-changing technologies.

I) Enhance Viewing and Analysis of Veterinary Radiology Images and Reports 

An optimized PACS can enhance the viewing and analysis of your veterinary radiology images and reports. It can enhance the viewing and analysis of veterinary radiology data in your facility through centralized archives. With this, your facility can eliminate several challenges that may hinder the viewing and analysis of client data. This helps your business accrue significant benefits. 

The first problem that your facility eliminates with a centralized archive is vendor “lock-ins,” the inability to interconnect system components from different vendors that offer archive solutions. Adopting different archives from different vendors can limit the viewing and analyses of images and reports at your facility. Different vendors employ unique data-sharing protocols and formats that may adversely affect interdepartmental sharing of client records. However, with a centralized archive provided by a single vendor, your practitioners can view images using a single viewer. This helps improve the sharing and viewing of patient records, helping your facility overcome workflow-related bottlenecks, cut waiting times for clients, and enhance treatment outcomes. 

Let’s look at an example. Take the case of Asteris Keystone PACS. Investing in this optimized PACS solution enables your business to reap the benefits of patented image handling protocols and browser-based DICOM viewers.

How do these features translate to improved outcomes for your business? 

First, with Asteris’s patented image handling protocols, your business can compress images without loss in quality, achieve faster off-site archiving speeds, and have the ability to view client images in case of lack of internet connectivity. These benefits improve your facility’s workflow and efficiency within your radiology business. 

Second, integrating a browser-based DICOM viewer into your operations helps your staff access and view client records in real time while maintaining the quality of renderings of the initial DICOM images. These features ensure that your facility eliminates any delays encountered when your staff members wait for studies to save to cloud-based archives, a common phenomenon with cloud-based solutions. Ultimately, such benefits can help your veterinary imaging facility develop an edge over its peers in the imaging space.

With a centralized archive, your facility eliminates complexities that affect the viewing and analyses of client images. Decentralized archives often introduce complexities to a veterinary radiology practice through proprietary standards. These heterogeneous standards limit the portability and interoperability of archiving systems. Moreover, heterogenous archiving solutions and interfaces can bind your organization to one type of archiving technology because it’s expensive to port client data to a different vendor’s interface. To your business, these un-optimized PACS can hinder efficiency by limiting the accessibility and sharing of essential client records. The resulting delays in diagnostic procedures can adversely affect treatment outcomes, patient satisfaction, and employee productivity. However, your organization can leverage an optimized PACS solution to reap the benefits of having a centralized archive in your practice.

Let’s look at Asteris Keystone as an example. When investing in this optimized PACS solution, your veterinary radiology business can leverage a homogenous and patented data packaging mechanism. This mechanism helps your staff share client images that are reduced by 55% without degrading image data. With this feature, your staff can assist in the faster transfer of files across networks or over the internet. The timely access of veterinary imaging records frees up more time for analysis and diagnosis, so working with this optimized imaging solution can improve accuracy and efficiency within your facility. Over time, this can help increase profitability.

Optimized PACS enhance the viewing and analyses of veterinary radiology images and reports by enabling the use of different computer tools to manipulate and process images. By working with soft copy images, optimized PACS enable the alteration of an image’s contrast and width, enabling the viewing of bony structures and soft tissues on a single exposure. For instance, with soft copy images supported by an optimized PACS, your veterinary radiologists can assess the left lower lobe behind the left cardiac silhouette. However, on an unexposed hardcopy chest radiograph, your practitioners may not be able to access this information. Thus, investing in an optimized PACS solution can enable your staff to increase the amount of information extractable from an image. Combined with technologies like photostimulable phosphor plates, your staff can enjoy a more dynamic range compared to working with traditional screen-film combinations. With these features, your staff can reap benefits related to the simultaneous visualization of structures with different radiodensities, helping lower exposure. 

With different computer tools to manipulate and process images—thanks to optimized PACS solutions—and technologies like photostimulable phosphor plates, your facility can reap significant benefits that relate to the efficient viewing and analyses of client data. The first benefit is shorter wait times for clients. Your staff can easily provide accurate diagnoses in record time. This cuts costs associated with delays and ineffective treatment plans. The second benefit relates to fewer retests and the subsequent costs. With your practitioners viewing and analyzing client images in more detail, they can provide accurate diagnoses of ailments, eliminating the need for retests. Given that retests can incur additional costs for your facility, eliminating errors helps improve your facility’s reputation and bottom line.

Optimized PACS also enhance the viewing and analysis of veterinary radiology data via the automatic and chronological ordering of client records. With optimized picture archiving solutions, your facility can improve the correct orientation and labeling of client data, easing the process of retrieving and utilizing such data. Criteria that optimized PACS can use include ordering client data, such as name, date, hospital number, and referring clinician, among others. With these features, optimized PACS promote the reviewing and examination of preceding studies and conducting intermodality comparisons, which help increase the accuracy of diagnostic procedures. With grouped and well-ordered client images and reports, your facility enhances its staff’s productivity, minimizing delays and incidences of lost data. Eventually, this promotes the accuracy of diagnostic procedures, improving your facility’s efficiency.

II) Leverage Cloud-Based Storage Systems to Improve Veterinary Radiology Efficiencies

Investing in an optimized PACS can help your facility leverage cloud-based archives. The goal of cloud-based archives is to provide scalable and simplified access to information technology services and computing resources. That said, your facility can exploit advantages availed by private cloud-based archives that adhere to government standards and that aim at improving the privacy and security of client data. 

With a cloud-based archive system, your facility can facilitate collaboration between veterinary specialists. Investing in a cloud-based PACS for your veterinary imaging practice simplifies the process of exchanging client records via web-based solutions.

By leveraging the ease of sharing client records between practitioners, your facility can increase cross-collaboration and consultation, improving the accuracy of diagnostic imaging reports. Noting that veterinary specialists can have unique skills in particular procedures, increased cross-disciplinary collaboration during the diagnostic process can help overcome challenges that lead to inaccurate diagnoses. With the ease of sharing client records, your business can leverage international expertise to help your facility take advantage of veterinary advances in other parts of the world. These can help your facility increase its operational efficiencies, reduce costs associated with retests, and improve treatment outcomes.

Investing in an optimized and cloud-based PACS helps improve your facility’s efficiency through convenient access. With cloud-based archives, your staff can leverage off-site and mobile access via any device and from anywhere. To add, your facility can benefit from online viewers and apps, reducing the need for on-site viewing of client records. With increased convenience, your staff can provide veterinary imaging reports in record time, enhancing the efficiencies in your facility. These benefits come from improvements in your workflow and help cut the costs of veterinary care, improve your patient’s satisfaction, and increase your staff’s productivity.

Let’s look at the cloud-based platform supported by Asteris Keystone PACS. Investing in this solution, your veterinary imaging staff can easily share and view client records, enabling cross-collaboration. Taking advantage of the Asteris Keystone Online app, your team can reap the benefits of accessing mobile and offsite veterinary imaging data via any platform. Your business will benefit from the automatic upgrade and update of Asteris Keystone’s viewing software and PACS. These can help your facility overcome bottlenecks that affect your efficiency.

Furthermore, investing in a veterinary radiology solution that integrates cloud storage can help your business cut operational costs and improve efficiency. Cloud-based veterinary PACS replace CDs and local archives, helping cut costs associated with the repurchase and maintenance of the conventional technologies. Adopting a cloud-based PACS also cuts the need for a huge internal IT department and reduces the office space required for local archives. With the reduced costs, your facility can invest in veterinary imaging solutions that help improve workflows. For instance, saved resources can be repurposed to acquire a leading cloud-based archive that incorporates a universal viewer. This will help your facility improve efficiency by leveraging patented image transfer methods and new technologies like web-based viewers. Ultimately, this will help boost your business’s effectiveness.

III) Improve Interoperability with an Optimized Application Programming Interface (API)

APIs are points of communication between systems that enable the communication and transfer of data between different archiving solutions. Depending on the configuration, APIs can enable systems in your facility to retrieve or send client records that are needed in making diagnostic reports. They can also help your facility share client records between systems.

So, how can optimized PACS that integrate APIs benefit your veterinary radiology business?

The first benefit relates to increased interconnectivity between PACS. With more veterinary radiology businesses shifting to cloud-based IT infrastructure and the use of digital information becoming an industry standard, interoperability between image archiving systems has become more challenging. However, adopting optimized PACs that integrate APIs simplifies interoperability for your business, enabling your staff and clients to share data more efficiently.

With increased interoperability due to open and secure APIs, your veterinary imaging business can take advantage of ethical standards relating to data use and privacy. Open APIs would give veterinary businesses the freedom to choose platforms, systems, and apps that suit their operations, and you can easily change a veterinary imaging solution to one that’s best suited for your operations. By overcoming problems associated with vendor “lock-ins” and expensive portability from one solution to another, your facility can adopt solutions that adhere to the ethical standards of managing pet parent records. These include principles of veterinary medical ethics and the veterinarian-client-patient relationship. With interoperable systems, your facility can easily migrate to a solution that adheres to DICOM standards. This can help your facility transfer images close to three times faster than your competitors, improving cross-specialty consultation and boosting client satisfaction at your facility. Adhering to ethical guidelines helps your facility avoid disruptions that relate to violating ethical guidelines, improving efficiency.

For instance, leveraging interoperability that’s supported by APIs can help your facility transition to a novel technology like Asteris Keystone PACS. With this PACS, your facility can enjoy compliance with veterinary medicine standards and DICOM guidelines, eliminating challenges introduced by non-compliance. Over time, this can help your facility improve data security. Compliance with standard protocols in managing the transmission of veterinary images and related data helps you fulfill your facility’s imaging and encoding needs. In turn, this helps eliminate risks that can put your client’s data at risk.

Increased interoperability also helps your facility seamlessly connect with diagnostic equipment, practice management software, and RIS. With interconnected veterinary imaging solutions, your facility can benefit from improved workflows and increased productivity among staff members. Highly interoperable systems can leverage an array of time-saving features—including pre-designed report templates and speech-to-text—when creating diagnostic reports. This helps cut the time required to deliver reports to veterinary practitioners and pet parents, contributing to the timely treatment of clients. Ultimately, highly interoperable veterinary imaging systems and their interlinked solutions help improve treatment outcomes and client satisfaction within your facility.

In addition, open-access APIs can help your PACS leverage increased interoperability, eliminating errors. With interoperable systems, your veterinary imaging staff can receive the benefits associated with laboratory information systems, radiology PACS, and electronic medical records. Effectively, this helps reduce the likelihood of errors. To clarify, by integrating decision support systems, your staff can avoid mix-ups that lead to misdiagnoses. This helps avoid expensive retests and resulting client dissatisfaction. API-based interoperability also helps your team access vital client records, helping save pet-parents the agony of losing their best friends. Over time, these benefits can help your organization improve diagnostic accuracy and eliminate costly delays.

Here at Asteris, it's our goal to help veterinarians make sound medical decisions with ease, clarity, and confidence by giving them the tools and insights that they need to optimize the way they work.
If you're ready to stop feeling like there's not enough time in your day, we can help you optimize your imaging processes and the way you work. Contact our specialists today to get started!

Excerpt

Better Imaging, Better Veterinary Practice Management

Introduction

As veterinary imaging has evolved, better imaging and veterinary practice management systems have become enormously valuable. With more veterinarians transitioning their practices to fully digitized systems, the need for optimized veterinary workflows supported by imaging and veterinary practice management solutions has increased exponentially. That’s due to the unique benefits that optimized imaging and veterinary management systems can provide a veterinary practice. These benefits include the ease of communicating with other practitioners, learning new treatments, catching errors, highlighting unseen clinical patterns, and reducing the complexities associated with cumbersome paperwork.

What are trends that have characterized the veterinary practice management space? What are their effects?

Veterinary practice management, a profession that involves the management of business and operations in veterinary practice, plays a key role in the success of your veterinary clinic. Understanding trends in veterinary practice management and how they impact your daily operations is crucial.

One of the major trends that have characterized the veterinary practice management space in the recent past is the increased adoption of cloud-based veterinary management software. With this trend, numerous workflow-related benefits are unlocked. Cloud-based solutions improve a vet practice’s workflow by enabling access to data from anywhere and at any time. Leveraging cloud-based solutions can help your facility offer tailored services and facilitate immediate collaboration with practitioners who aren’t physically present.

Cloud-based veterinary management software also improves veterinary practice workflows by supporting real-time backups. Investing in a cloud-based solution eliminates disruptions associated with data loss. Given the real-time backup feature that’s associated with cloud-based veterinary systems, your practice can focus on other business aspects rather than worrying about data loss in case of technical problems or a disaster.

Other benefits associated with cloud-based veterinary management software that can impact your practice’s workflow include improving collaboration between veterinary practitioners and simplifying scalability that ensures the smooth growth of your enterprise.

Another trend that has characterized the veterinary practice management space is the increased adoption of analytic tools in veterinary practices. Investing in analytic tools helps your veterinary practice improve its workflow in several ways. By implementing data analytic solutions, you can improve workflows by identifying bottlenecks that hinder efficient operations. Specifically, your practice can identify long and redundant processes that increase workflow-related inefficiencies. For instance, when leveraging analytical tools, your practice managers will have an end-to-end view of the processes involved in imaging and veterinary practice management in your facility. They can easily identify processes that can be automated or made paperless. Ultimately, implementing efficiency-improving changes can help your facility improve its workflows and reap the subsequent benefits.

Furthermore, analytical tools can enhance the workflows in your practice by simplifying regulatory compliance. These tools can help practice managers ensure that all the necessary and regulatory steps are followed and reported as required. With numerous regulations and reporting guidelines, it’s easy for your veterinary imaging practice to contravene these guidelines, introducing disruptions that affect your practice’s workflow. However, investing in analytic tools helps your practice managers create audit trials on a need-by-need basis. This improves your facility’s workflow by increasing access to information on your practice’s compliance and simplifying the creation of annual compliance reports.

While cloud-based veterinary management solutions and analytical tools have been game-changers, other trends have also impacted imaging and veterinary practice management and the associated workflow-related benefits. These trends include telemedicine, increased advocacy on sustainability, optimization of digital client experiences, and increased emphasis on the importance of leadership in imaging and veterinary practice management.

What are the challenges that affect veterinary imaging workflow from a veterinary practice management perspective? What are the impacts of resulting poor imaging workflows?

Lack of Reliable Technical Support

Today, more veterinary imaging facilities are shifting toward fully digitized practice management solutions. While such a solution can be a game-changer for your practice, the lack of reliable technical support can limit the benefits. A lack of support can introduce challenges that magnify workflow-related problems in your veterinary imaging practice.

In the event of technology breakdown, your veterinary practice may experience extended service unavailability due to unreliable technical support from your imaging and practice management solution provider. With veterinary practice management solutions being fully digitized, extended disruptions compound workflow challenges because veterinary imaging staff cannot access vital information. For instance, extended disruptions limit communication and collaboration between veterinary imaging practitioners on pet care. Cross-collaboration between veterinary imaging practitioners affects workflows in your facility, and prolonged disruptions can introduce bottlenecks to your facility’s workflow. These affect your practice’s ability to serve customers, affecting client satisfaction and your bottom line.

The lack of reliable technical support also affects the optimization of your veterinary practice management, introducing compliance-related challenges. In particular, prolonged disruptions affect your facility’s ability to maintain high compliance standards. To illustrate, extended breakdowns of veterinary practice management solutions limit your practice manager’s ability to ensure that employees and contractors adhere to local, state, and federal veterinary imaging regulations. This is mainly attributed to the lack of real-time monitoring and clear communication of compliance guidelines in your veterinary practice due to disruptions. Failure to stick to compliance guidelines attracts regular audits in your veterinary imaging practice, introducing disruptions that can adversely affect your facility’s workflow. From a management perspective, these disruptions can affect your practice’s reputation with veterinary imaging regulators and introduce avoidable costs in your business.

Inconsistencies in Image Quality

For veterinary imaging practices, arriving at an accurate diagnosis can be a highly complex process that involves numerous variables and is often error-prone. Since veterinary imaging is a major component of the overall diagnostic process, it can also be a major cause of diagnostic errors. While numerous factors influence diagnostic accuracy, a significant determinant is image quality and the inconsistencies therein. 

With more veterinary imaging facilities shifting to digital radiography—which has been seen as forgiving to poor exposure techniques—producing images with optimal quality hasn’t been universal due to patient positioning errors. Many veterinary imaging practitioners and practices receive images from multiple facilities that are produced using equipment from different manufacturers. The resulting inconsistencies can affect workflows in your veterinary practice in several ways.

Inconsistent image quality caused by imaging errors—like incorrect collimation, wrong exposure, centering and positioning errors, and artifacts—can cause poor imaging workflows by hindering the timely interpretation and communication of diagnostic results. The resulting inefficiencies in imaging workflows can hinder the effective treatment of pets because veterinary practitioners cannot prescribe treatment plans promptly. Studies have shown that harm to pet patients can be prevented when veterinary imaging practitioners communicate unexpected or critical findings in a timely manner. Ultimately, this affects treatment outcomes and levels of client satisfaction within your veterinary imaging practice.

Furthermore, inconsistent image quality also influences workflows by affecting overall image rejects and deletion rates. (Image rejects refer to veterinary images that don't provide diagnostic information in respect to the relevant clinical study due to low-quality images.) With the digitization of veterinary imaging and increased reliance on systems from different vendors, inconsistencies in image quality due to different protocols can introduce workflow challenges into your veterinary imaging practice. Variations in imaging quality, especially when working with referring veterinary practitioners, can adversely affect your practice's workflow via complicated diagnostic and follow-up procedures. To clarify, your veterinary imaging practitioners may need to seek additional information when conducting follow-up treatment on a pet patient. Practitioners must seek clarification on a case-by-case basis, so increased instances of image rejects can slow down operations at your practice. This can translate to negative outcomes like increased client dissatisfaction and turnover, reduced staff productivity, and increased veterinary imaging care costs. Eventually, inconsistencies in image quality can cause adverse business outcomes, like reduced competitive edge and declining profits.

Lack of Compatibility with Adopted Solutions
Today, compatibility has become increasingly important in veterinary medicine as the diversity of animal health data has grown and as more pressure has mounted on practice managers and other veterinary professionals to gather timely data for diagnostic and treatment purposes. The shift toward fully digitized veterinary imaging solutions has been essential for increasing the compatibility of animal health data. However, these systems can introduce compatibility challenges that can hinder the effective workflows in your veterinary practices.

For instance, fully digitized veterinary imaging solutions can introduce semantic interoperability challenges in your facility. Semantic interoperability refers to a veterinary system’s ability to share information and have that information interpreted properly by the recipient as intended by the sending practitioner. With variations in the interpretation of shared data, your veterinary imaging facility can experience workflow-related bottlenecks. To be specific, discrepancies in the interpretation of shared data can introduce challenges in collaboration between your staff and other veterinary practitioners. Given that cross-collaboration is a vital and regular process in veterinary imaging, the inability to interpret shared information can affect your facility’s workflow by hindering the continuity of veterinary care across multidisciplinary practitioners, organizations, languages, or timelines. Ultimately, these workflow hindrances can compound veterinary practice management issues, like inefficiencies in operational processes and reduced productivity among your staff.

The lack of interoperability between veterinary imaging solutions can also introduce workflow challenges to a veterinary imaging practice. (In veterinary medicine, interoperability refers to the ability to transfer and integrate patient data across multiple technology solutions). However, the production of veterinary imaging solutions by different vendors introduces variations in data-handling protocols and formats, limiting the sharing of images between veterinary practices. Data- and image-sharing can affect workflows by influencing the speed of diagnostic or follow-up imaging, and interoperability problems can adversely affect the quality of care offered to owners and their pets. For instance, the lack of interoperability between your veterinary imaging systems and those from referring practices may lead to an increase in image rejects, causing delays in the creation of clients’ diagnostic reports. This lowers the productivity of your staff because more time is spent solving imaging technology problems rather than assessing a client’s pet. Over time, glitches in your facility’s workflow can drive up costs via strained information technology teams, underutilized veterinary imaging solutions and staff, and prolonged periods for diagnoses.

Lack of Automated Updates and Backups

Working with veterinary imaging systems can be a game-changer for your facility’s workflows. However, if a solution fails to integrate automated updates and backups, it may spell doom for your business. The absence of automated update and backup systems can introduce system configuration and data-related challenges.

Complex and manual updates of veterinary imaging systems impact care delivery by affecting the effectiveness of different system configurations. The lack of automatic updating capabilities in veterinary imaging can delay the integration of vital changes that can improve this system’s effectiveness. Consequently, veterinary imaging solutions can lead to inefficient operations due to increased downtimes and inaccuracies, affecting your business's workflow. For example, relying on a veterinary imaging solution that needs manual updates delays the installation of new data-sharing protocols. This may increase inconsistencies in shared images, affecting the accuracy of diagnostic reports produced at your veterinary imaging facility.

Ultimately, this introduces workflow bottlenecks because staff members have to seek clarification—often from practitioners in other facilities—before making a diagnosis. The resulting workflow challenges limit the timely delivery of pet care.

Furthermore, veterinary imaging solutions that rely on manual backup systems can also affect workflows in your veterinary imaging practice. Workflow challenges mainly stem from various scenarios that veterinary practices experience. Manual updates and backup systems are more likely to experience cyberattacks. Delays in installing upgrades often increase the likelihood of an imaging solution experiencing a cyberattack, locking out essential staff from vital patient records. Veterinary practitioners rely on digitized records to offer accurate diagnoses, and the occurrence of a cyberattack in your veterinary practice can erase patient records that aren't backed up, adversely affecting imaging workflows. Ultimately, this deteriorates the quality of care that your clients get, increasing the likelihood of higher client turnover in your facility.

The lack of automated updates and backups can also affect your facility’s compliance with government guidelines and standards. For instance, failure to update veterinary imaging solutions may introduce glitches that fail to notify imaging practitioners of ionizing radiations that go beyond what’s prescribed in the International Atomic Energy Agency Safety Standards Series. Failure to comply with national guidelines attracts prolonged reviews and assessment of veterinary practices operations. These regulatory investigations can disrupt the normal operations of your staff, increasing the negative effects of inefficient workflows. In turn, the negative effects of failure to comply with standards—that result from manual updates and backups—can adversely affect the achievement of your practice’s goals.

Inefficient update and backup systems can affect your imaging practice’s workflow by influencing disaster recovery processes. Without a reliable system upgrade and data backup plans, your client’s data is at a higher risk in the event of a disaster that leads to data loss. Poorly updated and backed-up imaging systems have a higher likelihood of experiencing complete data loss when disasters strike. For your veterinary imaging facility, complete data loss would adversely affect workflows by hindering the creation of diagnostic reports and prompting clients to take retests during follow-up treatments. In such a situation, your veterinary practice will lose clients’ trust, see an increase in the costs of care, and incur additional costs trying to restore vital client data.

How can optimized imaging workflows impact doing business in your radiology practice?

In veterinary practice management, optimized imaging workflows refer to repeatable processes to which repeatable rules and automation are applied, making the processes more efficient, eliminating errors, and encouraging cross-specialty collaboration. Working with optimized imaging workflows impacts how practice managers conduct their businesses and reap the benefits therein. Therefore, assessing each benefit and explaining how they can influence practice management outcomes can shed light on what practitioners can expect when investing in solutions that optimize imaging workflows in their practices. 

Improve Staff Productivity

Optimized imaging solutions are crucial for improving staff productivity in a veterinary imaging practice. By investing in optimized solutions, your veterinary imaging practice can increase staff productivity by leveraging improved report creation approaches, simplified image-sharing protocols, and better management of multiple modalities. To clarify, improved report creation procedures that incorporate predesigned templates and an array of time-saving features help reduce the time required to create diagnostic reports at your veterinary imaging practice. Working with optimized solutions also improves your staff’s productivity by enabling practitioners to view client images and diagnose ailments with confidence. Using technologies like integrated DICOM viewers, your veterinary imaging staff can employ features like a multidimensional planar reconstruction to achieve greater accuracy in diagnostic processes. Over time, these features will improve your facility’s overall staff productivity, helping cut the costs of care at your facility, improve your competitive edge, and enhance veterinary practice management outcomes.

To understand the magnitude of optimized solutions in your veterinary imaging practice, let’s look at Asteris Keystone software as an example. With this highly customizable veterinary imaging solution, your facility can improve its staff’s productivity exponentially. By leveraging the solution’s application programming interface (API), your staff can easily access client records, track examinations, and make schedules by working seamlessly with other veterinary imaging platforms. Since APIs improve interoperability in tech systems and enhance communication, integrating such a system into your veterinary practice management strategy can help eliminate workflow bottlenecks. Ultimately, your facility can achieve many veterinary practice management goals, like timely diagnostic reports, high-quality services to clients, accurate and timely diagnoses of pet ailments, and lower costs of pet care.

Furthermore, optimized imaging workflows can improve your staff’s productivity by eliminating distractions. Research has shown that distractions impact staff productivity because it takes approximately twenty-five minutes for a practitioner to resume previous tasks. Therefore, adopting optimized veterinary imaging workflows introduces systems that can help your staff communicate more effectively via inbuilt systems rather than personal phones. With optimized information sharing systems, veterinary imaging practitioners don’t have to stay on the phone to convey diagnostic results—optimized solutions automate the sending of diagnostic reports to all participants. Also, optimized imaging workflows can eliminate duplicate processes within your facility. They can ensure that your staff members don’t repeat history questions for a specific pet, annoying pet owners and increasing the time needed to diagnose a particular case. In turn, efficiencies introduced by optimized imaging workflows can increase your staff’s productivity because your staff will be able to focus on the most important tasks.

Improve Collaboration and Consultation
Optimized imaging workflows promote collaboration and consultation within veterinary imaging practices. Notably, optimized workflows integrate efficient picture archiving and communication systems (PACS). With PACS, practice managers benefit from the efficient storage of client images and programs that are capable of displaying images in the DICOM III format. Also, PACS can integrate tools that aid in the evaluation of images and support simultaneous viewing at different locations. This greatly improves collaboration and consultation in your veterinary imaging practice. With the capability to simultaneously view client images, your staff can collaborate with various imaging specialists to diagnose different ailments. Increased collaboration helps improve the accuracy of diagnostic reports, improving clinical outcomes. Over time, improved diagnosis helps improve client retention rates and lower the cost of treatment at your facility.

Let’s look at the case of the optimized imaging workflow that incorporates Asteris Keystone PACS. With this PACS solution, your facility can improve collaboration and consultation with an integrated DICOM image viewer that supports 2D Multi-planar Reconstruction. With this feature, your staff and consultants can easily reconstruct vital images in multiple planes, helping your facility achieve greater diagnostic accuracy. This will boost treatment outcomes in your facility. Asteris Keystone PACS also works with other DICOM-compliant viewers and integrates a patented image transfer method that can help your facility transfer DICOM and non-DICOM images two to three times faster than other providers. With the ease of sharing images due to Keystone, your staff can easily seek clarification or consult on a variety of diagnostic issues. This can improve your staff’s productivity and help your facility achieve its veterinary practice management goals.

Optimized imaging workflows can improve collaboration and consultation by making one-to-one consultations with pet owners possible. With such consultations, your veterinary practice can offer excellent customer service. Sometimes, operations can get quite involved, limiting the personal touch that clients will get when visiting your practice. However, with optimized imaging workflows, your facility can prioritize interactions between pet owners and practitioners. Due to a warm and inviting atmosphere that accompanies a human touch, your clients will feel more comfortable entrusting their pets to your imaging practitioner’s care. These minor touches can help your practice stand out among competitors and help align your veterinary practice’s activities with your client’s expectations. Ultimately, your practice manager can achieve higher client satisfaction and retention rates, cut costs of veterinary imaging care, and improve profitability.

Improve Data Safety and Efficiency with a Hybrid System

With optimized imaging solutions, which often incorporate a hybrid architecture, your veterinary imaging practice can improve data safety and efficiency. Optimized hybrid imaging solutions often employ systems that combine complementary imaging modalities to improve diagnostic accuracy and treatment outcomes. Hybrid systems ensure that more detailed diagnostic information is obtained, providing a broad view of a particular ailment. This improves your facility’s efficiency because your staff can make accurate diagnoses while minimizing expensive and time-wasting retests. Optimized imaging workflows that incorporate hybrid systems can also ensure data safety by supporting automatic updates and backups. With hybrid imaging systems, various tailored veterinary imaging solutions can be interlinked to ensure that high-quality images from your practice are stored in real time. This ensures that your facility does not experience disruptions due to data loss or have images with inconsistent quality.

For example, optimized imaging workflows that incorporate Keystone’s hybrid architecture can improve your facility’s data safety and operational efficiency. On data safety, Asteris Keystone Software Suite enables your facility to overcome the hustles and worries accompanying manual backups and system updates via local and off-site image-archiving solutions and automated updates. With Asteris leveraging cloud-based servers and an array of patented image-handling protocols, your imaging team will benefit from compression techniques that maintain image quality, high-speed off-site archiving systems, and highly reliable off-site storage systems that provide access to data regardless of internet connectivity. 

On operational efficiency, Keystone supports a variety of systems that improve service delivery at your facility. For data safety, Keystone incorporates reliable data recovery solutions that simplify the recovery of lost or corrupted files. This eliminates disruptions caused by data loss. The Keystone PACS also improves the viewing (via a web browser or Asteris’s online DICOM viewer) and transfer of client records from any device, anywhere and at any time. The improved access to patient records improves efficiency by eliminating delays caused by ineffective communication between imaging practitioners. 

Another efficiency-boosting feature supported by Asteris is the pay-as-you-go model. With this feature, your facility only pays for studies that your staff has accessed, cutting costs associated with extended service agreements. Increased costs may introduce barriers to technology use, so this payment feature can help your facility adopt the game-changing technology without expensive commitments. This benefit ensures the optimization of your veterinary practice, helping unlock numerous cost-related benefits. 

Cumulatively, Asteris Keystone’s efficiency-improving features will benefit your facility, improving your competitiveness in the veterinary imaging space.

Here at Asteris, it's our goal to help veterinarians make sound medical decisions with ease, clarity, and confidence by giving them the tools and insights that they need to optimize the way they work.
If you're ready to stop feeling like there's not enough time in your day, we can help you optimize your imaging processes and the way you work. Contact our specialists today to get started