Through the use of templates and custom fields in the dictation application, the radiologist’s workflow can be streamlined; however they still must manually enter detailed info such as pregnancy and carotid ultrasound exams, which introduces the risk of error and slows reporting.
Utilizing the detailed measurement information contained in a DICOM Structured Report (SR) is an effective way to reduce data entry errors and streamline reporting workflows for dictation applications. In particular, Corepoint Integration Engine can extract the structured measurement data from DICOM SR and feed PowerScribe 360 with an HL7 v2 order message to automate the population of these measurements in a dictated report.
Corepoint Integration Engine’s DICOM functionality allows for parsing the DICOM SR data and making it available for use while populating an HL7 v2 order message. This HL7 v2 order message, when used in conjunction with the dictation application’s templates and custom fields, automates the entry of detailed measurements into the report.
Following are examples of how radiology practices are populating PS360 with required patient data:
North State Radiology
Scott Adair at North State Radiology in Chico, Calif., developed logic to parse the structured report and create an HL7 v2 order message that is sent to PowerScribe 360, which is illustrated in the image above.
The OBX segments in the HL7 order message are interpreted by PowerScribe 360 as custom fields, which allow for automatic population of dictated measurement data for that study. Configurable duplicate measurement validation and unit conversion are a key part of this action list.
“Structured reporting and data-driven workflows—especially in RIS/HIS systems—are clearly the future of healthcare. Unfortunately, most vendors have to be dragged into it kicking and screaming. Corepoint empowers us by making us less reliant on those vendors.” -Scott Adair, North State Radiology
Radiology Consultants of Iowa (RCI)
RCI, located in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, learned of the workflow developed at North State Radiology and was able to utilize the same SR parsing action list in their environment. Because RCI had already established their own Powerscribe 360 custom fields, a post-processing action list was required to perform conversions on the custom fields that are dynamically produced from the SR.
RCI’s post-processing logic also performs custom unit conversions and duplicate measurement handling before sending the message to PowerScribe 360.
What we were able to do using action list logic to remove duplicate measurements is huge. The other products just spit out the measurements and they are all cluttering the report. The action list processing allowed us to include only the pertinent measurements. Very cool.” – Jeff Ahrendsen, RCI
Other DICOM example: Central Illinois Radiologic Associates (CIRA)
CIRA, Peorio, Ill., has adopted a custom workflow utilizing our DICOM Gear connection. CIRA’s workflow:
- CIRA’s customer (referring hospital) scans the patient and the image will exist on their PACS or other modality
- That scan is then uploaded to Corepoint Integration Engine through the DICOM gear via TCP/IP
- The Corepoint DICOM Gear connection parses the header data and converts in into XML, maps it into an HL7 message that can be used as an order message into PS360, CIRA’s billing provider, and VNA.
CIRA has connected 15 rural clinics to its PS360, billing provider and VNA using this methodology.
