How does the radiology PACS handle cardiology images?
An important element to consider is how one system handles the images of the other. X-ray angiograms (XA) and ultrasound modalities frequently send images already compressed to some degree, either with lossless or lossy jpeg compression. Be sure that the PACS archive can accept a compressed image, and confirm, via both vendors’ DCS, that the systems support DICOM in a compatible manner. This will be very important in ensuring that exams sent to your cardiology PACS are archived on the radiology PACS in the exact same format, and consequently can be retrieved from the archive in the format in which they were originally sent. You will want to consider carefully what data the cardiology modalities enter into the DICOM header, and how your radiology PACS handles that data. The concern here is whether the images will look the same on the radiology PACS as they do on the cardiology PACS, if you plan to view the images from both systems. Another important consideration is whether the radiolog
