Idaho Image Exchange Goes Live

The Idaho Health Data Exchange has launched an image exchange with St. Luke's Health System in Boise.

With HIE services provided by eHealth Technologies, the image exchange allows physicians, clinicians and hospitals to collaborate on diagnostic-quality images through a web app.

The Idaho Health Data Exchange says that X-rays, MRIs, CT scans, PET scans and ultrasounds that typically take hours or days to obtain can now be accessed within a few minutes of being taken.

"By accessing the Idaho Health Data Exchange, clinicians can collaborate on mutual patients thus improving the efficiency and effectiveness in rendering high quality, low cost care,” Marc Chasin, MD, interim CIO and CMIO at St. Luke's Health System, said in a media release.

"It allows radiologists to share images performed outside of the system and view them in order to improve the diagnostic quality and changes in the care of the patient," he said.

The image exchange should replace the various and sometimes laborious workflows currently used for obtaining images — calling or faxing in requests and receiving the images on a CD via mail or a with patients. In the Idaho Health Data Exchange’s service, as soon as an image is signed off by a radiologist, it will be accessible via a secure web link by a patient’s physician.

Scott Carrell, executive director of the Idaho Health Data Exchange, cited a variety of benefits to the image exchange, including the reduced need for duplicate exams, limited radiation exposure for patients, reduction of the risk for medical errors from incomplete records and the ability for physicians to easily compare current and past tests.