Medical Imaging Trends and Implementation : Issues and Challenges for Developing Countries

To meet the increasing demand for radiological services over the past few years there has been a growing trend toward introducing medical imaging across hospitals worldwide. Medical imaging technologies consist of a number of components including PACS (Picture Archiving Communication Systems), RIS (Radiology Information Systems) and HIS (Hospital Information Systems) which are typically linked and interfaced through a computer network. In this paper, we present an overview of global trends in the deployment of medical imaging and highlight some of the key issues and challenges which are faced by developing countries in its implementatio