PACS: need solution for a small outpatient clinic

[Ligament]

This is so low volume compared to the petabytes of images you guys deal with on a daily basis, try not to laugh.

Setting:
1. Interventional Pain Clinic. 1-2 doctors.
2. One clinic location
3. Entire office is Mac OS X

Goal:

1. PACS server (or NAS). If server prefer Mac OSX or if NAS prefer synology or QNAP
2. Staff will pop image CD in reader, load into PACS
3. Physician can access PACS via DICOM viewer (prefer HOROS or OSIRIX) on any computer in the clinic over wifi.
4. Not generating reports. Viewing images only.

Will be adding imaging from 2-8 patients per day, each patient having 1-4 imaging studies most likely. 90% MRI, 5% xray, 4% CT, 1% other (spect)

Some options:
1. Mac Mini running OSIRIX X as a PACS server and high speed external CD reader
2. Synology NAS running this plugin
PACS - Add-on Packages | Synology Inc.
--if use NAS solution, how to best get images from CD onto NAS?
3. Cloud PACS? What is the cost of such a service?

Want to stay away from Windows or Linux. Dont like Windows. Like Linux in theory but dont know how to administer it and dont have time to learn.

I am the owner, physician and IT guy.

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[colbgw02]

In my experience, cloud-based PACS usually charges somewhere around $6/exam, assuming that you're not storing mammograms. I'm not sure if they'd be interested in such a small account, but it wouldn't hurt to ask. Alternatively, I've seen hospitals store images for nearby physicians, but I don't have any idea about the cost. Just thinking that might be worthwhile because your relationship with the hospital may be enough to overcome the challenges of doing this with such a low volume of exams.

 

[maxxor]

How many cases per month are we talking?

If you are familiar with OsiriX, honestly I’d just pay for the MD license and use one of the new MacMinis as the DICOM server and set up all the other Macs in the office to Q/R from the central server and then view cases as needed. It’s not super complicated so you could train secretaries to upload disks.

Then use whatever whatever vetted backup system you want to back up the MacMini OsiriX archive. Preferably 2 onsite and 1 offsite at minimum if you care about the data.

While Horos is a “free” version derived from the OsiriX codebase about ~3 years ago, they have diverged since then and OsiriX is significantly more performant and streamlined than Horos at this point. You can go cheap, but it will cost you in time.

 

[Ligament]

How many cases per month are we talking?

If you are familiar with OsiriX, honestly I’d just pay for the MD license and use one of the new MacMinis as the DICOM server and set up all the other Macs in the office to Q/R from the central server and then view cases as needed. It’s not super complicated so you could train secretaries to upload disks.

Then use whatever whatever vetted backup system you want to back up the MacMini OsiriX archive. Preferably 2 onsite and 1 offsite at minimum if you care about the data.

While Horos is a “free” version derived from the OsiriX codebase about ~3 years ago, they have diverged since then and OsiriX is significantly more performant and streamlined than Horos at this point. You can go cheap, but it will cost you in time.

Will be adding imaging from 2-8 patients per day, each patient having 1-4 imaging studies most likely. 90% MRI, 5% xray, 4% CT, 1% other (spect)

Thank you for your detailed reply.