Combining fast response and low cost in an intensive care unit viewing station

This paper describes a prototype viewing station for the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) that combines a low cost with a fast response for the primary viewing tasks. A single monitor is used together with the possibility to switch to another image on the same screen instantaneously. To reduce the time for image retrieval and display, the viewing station anticipates the need for particular images, and preloads these from the disk into the internal memory whenever the computer has some idle time. Preliminary experience suggests that the use of a single monitor is no fundamental limitation for this application. Most of the time, the system can anticipate which images will be required shortly. This has an important impact on the user efficiency.