Services
Connectivity
Our consultants participate in the DICOM, HL7 and IHE standards activities participating and chairing various working groups and committees. This allows us to not only have an insight on the current standardization effort and intimate knowledge of these standards, but also know where the standard activity is heading. We provide customized consulting for both vendors and users. This can be in the following format:
Gap Analysis
Generation of a connectivity gap analysis for digital modalities and/or PACS systems by evaluating whether a DICOM conformance statement, interface specifications, and integration profile definitions meets either generic or institution specific requirements. This gap analysis can be used as the basis for negotiating the purchase agreement and/or identifying potential connectivity and workflow issues upfront so they can be properly addressed.
Conformance Validation
Evaluation of interfaces by validating the DICOM messages such as images and/or other DICOM objects. Prior to connecting a new modality to a PACS system, or for verifying whether the output of a device meets specification, as part of an acceptance test, we can provide a validation of the output. We either capture the information over the Internet or, preferable, can evaluate the information sent to us on an exchange media or electronically.
IHE Validation
As an extension to the messaging validation of DICOM, HL7 and other connectivity standards, we can validate the IHE conformance of your product. We use both the same tools as used for the IHE connectathons (MESA), with additional public domain and proprietary test and validation tools. We use a test bed consisting of the IHE actors that can execute almost all of the IHE transactions using a secure connection to your device over the Internet, providing a cost-effective method to test your device. A full test report is made available with recommendations.
Conformance Statements
We generate and/or audit DICOM conformance statements as well as HL7 interface definitions and IHE profile statements for vendors. OTConsulting has experience with these documents, because it has reviewed hundreds of them, generated quite a few from scratch for various vendors, and has also actively participated in the standardization of the conformance template as defined in the DICOM standard. We can generate your conformance statement for you ask us for a quote as the fee depends on the complexity and scope of the interface specification.
Connectivity Retainers
We have retainer contracts with many vendors as well as health care institutions, who rely on us for very detailed questions as well as independent advice on connectivity issues between different devices. One can view this as an “insurance policy” whereby you have always access to expertise in case there are any problems. Questions are sent to us by e-mail, and a reply is mostly received within 24 hours, or, if it is a really complex problem that requires research and consultation with other domain experts, the response time frame is indicated. A retainer contract is typically established for 10 hours with 3-monthly statements to be provided to the client specifying how much time is spent on what subject.
