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Swiss precision
Planning the RIS/PACS project for the four clinic locations took about
two years. The application for the project was filed by PD Dr. Duewell
with company management back in March 2002. In October that was
followed by the invitation to tender and the review of bids from the
various manufacturers. The senior radiologists and company management
selected GE Healthcare from a large number of competitors. The
full range of services comprising RIS, PACS and reporting stations from
a single source, in conjunction with the competence displayed by contacts
from the company, soon convinced the clients.
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In March 2003 the project groups launched the evaluation phase
together with GE Healthcare. Step by step the teams headed by
Stephan Leggenhagger, head of Technical and Computer Services in
the Radiology Department, worked their way through all the sections
of STGAG in order to establish the cost of integrating the imaging
systems into the future network.
After six months of meticulous joint
planning the demand was established accurately. The client and the
system provider were talking the same language. The budget was
accurately defined. Clinic management was able to file the implementation
application with company management.
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Implementation of the project finally commenced in September
2004 and it ended upon commissioning of the RIS in February 2005
and the PACS in April 2005. The entire planning phase was headed
by the project committee under PD Dr. Duewell. Other members of
the committee were representatives from institute management,
technical
services and the system provider. The project committee
also had a core team controlling the RIS, PACS and infrastructure subprojects.
During the course of the project the project leader decided to
merge the two RIS and PACS sub-projects because they overlapped to a large extent.
The data for the conceptual design of Digital Radiography
was based on a figure of 66,000 examinations a year and a
resulting data volume of 4.2 terabytes. The Radiology Departments
at the Frauenfeld and Münsterlingen Canton Hospitals were to be
connected via a 100 megabit per second data line, Psychiatry in
Münsterlingen with a 10 megabit per second one and St. Katharinental
Rehabilitation Clinic with a 2 megabit per second interface via
secure VPN tunnels (Virtual Private Network).
During preparations for real operation of RIS and PACS the training
sessions were started for staff members. For the GE system the
project managers offered master data, power user and master
instructor training sessions. Radiologists were familiarised with
their new tools, the reporting stations. On Day X, when the digital
systems were switched over to real operation, a certain amount of
nervousness
and stress was perceptible amongst many of the people
involved. However, the intensive preparatory phase paid off. The
switch to the new RIS, and to the PACS three months later, proved to
be completely unproblematical.
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PD Dr. Stefan Duewell,
Senior Specialist at Frauenfeld Canton Hospital"Thanks to the integrated RIS/PACS from GE Healthcare all the X-ray images are available
in emergencies, in the operating theatre, at doctors' appointments and at clinic conferences,
irrespective of where the images are archived. We save time between admission,
reporting and distribution and everyone involved in the process has direct access", says
PD Dr. Stefan Duewell, Senior Specialist at Frauenfeld Canton Hospital.
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Stephan Lenggenhager,
Head of Technical and Computer Services Radiology
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