[The PACS concept of the University of Regensburg]

Planning a PACS (Picture Archiving and Communication System) with the aim of a filmless hospital. The service for the referring physicians should be optimised.

Statistical analysis of data from the RIS (Radiological Information System), customer survey, workflow analysis and cost effectiveness analysis was the basis for planning the PACS.

The calculated data quantity of the institute is 6.2 gigabyte per day or 1.7 terabyte per year. The referring physicians wanted to have the examination in 93% of the cases on the same day. For 53% of the cases remote studies were necessary for reading. Only 2.3% of these pictures were older than two years. The organisation of the department makes it necessary to have access to the examination of all modalities from each diagnosis workstation.

Due to specific attributes of the institute, a fast nearline archive, a clustering of the diagnosis workstations and a DiCOM based picture distribution were planned.