Nicholas J. Mankovich

Security for the digital information age of medicine: Issues, applications, and implementation

Privacy and integrity of medical records is expected by patients. This privacy and integrity is often mandated by regulations. Traditionally, the security of medical records has been based on physical lock and key. As the storage of patient record information shifts from paper to digital, new security concerns arise. Digital cryptographic methods provide solutions to many of these new concerns. In this paper we overview new security concerns, new legislation mandating secure medical records and solutions providing security.

Enterprise communication framework as a means to PACS/information systems interoperability

Interoperability among healthcare applications goes beyond connectivity to allow components to exchange structured information, and to work together in a predictable, coordinated fashion. To facilitate building an interoperability infrastructure an Enterprise Communication Framework (ECF) was developed by the members of the Andover Working Group for Healthcare Interoperability. The ECF consists of four models, (1) the use case model, (2) the domain information model, (3) the interaction model, and (4) the message model. To realize this framework, a software component called the enterprise communicator is used. In this paper we will demonstrate the use of the framework in interoperating a PACS with a radiology information system.