The core will provide the centralized engineering, clinical data collection, and data management support required to effectively carry out the Program Project. The engineers in the Core will share the software developmental responsibilities for all the individual projects. The same engineers have implemented the currently operational Picture Archiving and Communication System (PACS) at the University of Pennsylvania Medical Center (UPMC). The PACS is continually growing in scope and currently includes inputs from Computed Radiographic devices, MRI, CT, GI/Fluoroscopy, Ultrasound, SPECT and PET modalities. Multiple image storage and archive systems are also integrated into the PACS along with various image display workstations supporting resolutions from 1kx1k through 2kx2k. To tie things together a standards based (ACR/NEMA, DICOM) software suite has been internally developed to support a link to the DECRad Radiology Information System and to optimize information flow on the PACS. The Core personnel also possess over eight years of experience in carrying out large-scale prospective clinical evaluations of PACS. A full time Senior Research Coordinator is in charge of collecting the data generated by the experiments and ensuring their quality. Data collection has been streamlined to minimize extra effort on the part of the test subjects. Wherever possible, automatic methods of data collection have been implemented. Data are entered into and managed by a Sybase Database Management System. The data are then subjected to formal statistical analyses with the active participation of the Project Leaders and the Statistical Consultant. Software for data analysis includes the Excell and SAS programs as well as a software suite to conduct Roc analyses. The results are returned to the investigators of each individual project for interpretation.
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