How SeePlus DICOM Streamlines PACS Integration and Workflow

How SeePlus DICOM Streamlines PACS Integration and WorkflowRadiology departments, imaging centers, and hospitals rely on efficient Picture Archiving and Communication Systems (PACS) to manage medical images and related data. Poor integration, slow image access, and complex workflows can create bottlenecks that affect diagnostic speed and clinician satisfaction. SeePlus DICOM addresses these challenges with a set of features designed to simplify integration, improve interoperability, and accelerate daily workflows for radiologists, technologists, and IT teams.

What is SeePlus DICOM?

SeePlus DICOM is a medical imaging middleware and viewer suite that implements the DICOM standard for storing, transmitting, and visualizing medical images. It functions as a bridge between imaging modalities (CT, MRI, ultrasound, etc.), PACS servers, and end-user workstations, offering tools for image routing, conversion, storage, viewing, and reporting. SeePlus emphasizes compatibility, speed, and flexible deployment options, supporting on-premises, hybrid, and cloud environments.

Key Integration Features

• DICOM-compliant communication: SeePlus uses standard DICOM services (C-STORE, C-FIND, C-MOVE, C-GET) to communicate with modalities and PACS, ensuring compatibility with most vendors.
• Flexible modality routing: Allows automated routing rules based on modality, institution, or study type, reducing manual forwarding and lost studies.
• Multi-protocol support: In addition to DICOM, SeePlus can interface with HL7 for orders and results, and supports web standards (WADO, DICOMweb) for browser-based access.
• Modality worklist integration: Supports DICOM Modality Worklist (MWL) so modalities can pull scheduled patient and study information directly from the RIS or HIS.
• DICOM tag mapping and normalization: Normalizes inconsistent or proprietary DICOM tags from different modalities to maintain data consistency across the PACS.
• Gateway and translation services: Translates between different DICOM versions and vendor-specific implementations, smoothing integration with legacy systems.

Workflow Improvements for Clinical Staff

• Faster access to studies: SeePlus optimizes image transfer and caching so radiologists and clinicians get quicker access to images, reducing study turnaround time.
• Unified viewer: A single, web-capable viewer supports multi-planar reconstructions (MPR), series comparison, measurement tools, and hanging protocols so radiologists don’t switch between multiple applications.
• Custom hanging protocols: Users can create and share hanging protocols tailored to study types (e.g., chest CT, neuro MR), which accelerates review and standardizes presentation across readers.
• Integrated reporting: Structured reporting templates and integrations with reporting systems reduce transcription errors and speed reporting. Some deployments support voice recognition or export to third-party RIS/EMR.
• Prior study retrieval: Automatic prior retrieval and side-by-side comparison reduce interpretation time and improve diagnostic confidence.

Benefits for IT and PACS Administrators

• Simplified onboarding: Pre-built connectors and vendor profiles shorten the time needed to bring new modalities online.
• Centralized management: Administration console for monitoring study flows, anonymization jobs, storage quotas, and system health.
• Scalability: Architected to scale horizontally—add more storage or viewer nodes as volume grows without major reconfiguration.
• Security and compliance: Supports DICOM TLS, role-based access control (RBAC), audit logging, and anonymization tools to comply with HIPAA and other regulations.
• Automated failover and redundancy: High-availability deployment options reduce downtime risk for critical imaging services.

Deployment Models

SeePlus DICOM supports various deployment models to fit institutional needs:

• On-premises: For organizations requiring full control over data and infrastructure.
• Cloud-hosted: Enables remote access, simplified maintenance, and elastic scaling.
• Hybrid: Keeps sensitive data on-prem while leveraging cloud services for secondary storage, disaster recovery, or remote reading.

Each model affects latency, maintenance burden, and total cost of ownership; SeePlus provides tools for migration and hybrid synchronization.

Interoperability Scenarios

• Multi-vendor modality environments: SeePlus harmonizes incoming studies with tag mapping and vendor profiles so the PACS receives consistent, searchable metadata.
• Cross-site referrals and teleradiology: DICOMweb and secure transfer options facilitate sending studies between sites or to remote readers.
• RIS/HIS integrations: HL7 bridges ensure orders, scheduling, and patient demographics remain synchronized.
• Research and AI pipelines: Supports anonymized bulk export and DICOM SR or JSON output formats for downstream AI processing and research datasets.

Performance and Optimization Techniques

• Intelligent prefetching: Predictive prefetch pulls likely-needed priors or series to local cache based on schedules or user access patterns.
• Compression options: Offers lossless and controlled lossy compression settings to balance storage and image fidelity.
• Load balancing: Distributes viewer sessions and DICOM store requests across nodes to prevent bottlenecks during peak hours.
• Thin-client viewing: Browser-based viewers reduce workstation hardware requirements and centralize rendering on server-side or use optimized WebGL rendering for client-side performance.

Real-world Use Cases

• Regional imaging network: A health system using SeePlus unified imaging from multiple hospitals and outpatient centers, enabling centralized reading and consistent archives.
• Emergency radiology: Prefetch rules paired with fast routing deliver trauma CTs to on-call radiologists immediately, shortening door-to-interpretation time.
• Teleradiology service: Cloud deployment allows a teleradiology provider to ingest studies from many external sites, apply anonymization, queue reads, and return results securely.
• Research collaboration: An academic center exports de-identified studies via DICOMweb for multi-institutional research without disrupting clinical PACS.

Challenges and Considerations

• Network bandwidth: High-volume imaging requires robust WAN links for cross-site transfers; compression and scheduling help mitigate limits.
• Change management: Introducing new hanging protocols or viewer workflows needs radiologist buy-in and training.
• Legacy devices: Some very old modalities may need intermediate gateways or manual configuration to ensure correct DICOM behavior.
• Cost vs benefit: Cloud deployments reduce local maintenance but introduce ongoing operational costs; evaluate long-term TCO.

Measuring Success

Track these KPIs after SeePlus deployment:

• Study turnaround time (order to final report)
• Time-to-first-image for emergent studies
• Percentage of studies with successful prior retrieval
• Radiologist workstation time per study
• System uptime and failed transfer rates

Conclusion

SeePlus DICOM streamlines PACS integration and clinical workflows by providing robust DICOM compatibility, flexible routing, centralized management, and modern viewing/reporting tools. Its support for multiple deployment models and interoperability standards makes it suitable for a wide range of clinical environments—from single-site radiology departments to distributed health networks and teleradiology services. When implemented with attention to network capacity and end-user training, SeePlus can significantly reduce delays, standardize image presentation, and improve overall imaging service efficiency.