A theme that emerged in today's booth tours and lectures was the importance of radiologists' participation in patient treatment -- and even further on a broader level, shaping health policy.
Matt McLenon, CEO of Softek Solutions Inc., said his customers are realizing that to keep the profession on U.S. soil, they have to play an integral role in monitoring follow-up exams and becoming more involved in the care process. Helping them accomplish this goal, Softek made its RSNA debut this year, demonstrating its Illuminate product.
A plug-and-play product, Illuminate is a free-text search solutionthat allows for data-mining within the Philips iSite PACS. With the technology, iSite users can set up a variety of alerts, such as exam alerts that notify them of a scheduled, or missed, scan for a particular patient. An image alert enables users to send critical cases to other doctors, while a patient alert lets users monitor a patient over time. McLenon also demonstrated the significance of a search criteria alert, which notifies users of new indexed studies that match a specific search criterion.
During her RSNA Gold Medal acceptance speech, honoree Peggy J. Fritzsche, M.D., reminisced about the days when radiologists, confined to poorly lit rooms, used goggles to help them read film. "As radiologists, we no longer need the goggles, but we are still working in the dark," she told her peers, who had filled the Arie Crowne Theater. Fritzsche urged her fellow radiologists to feel the power of the human encounter and participate in the advocacy work of the professional societies.
Later, guest orator Elizabebth G. McFarland, M.D., stressed the importance of fighting the obstacles to CTC coverage. "Political involvement is everything at this point in the game," she stated, inciting audience members to use their voices and "give CMS the information they need to know."