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Use of a personal digital assistant for viewing echocardiograms

2004; Elsevier BV; Volume: 17; Issue: 3 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1016/j.echo.2003.10.020

1097-6795

Darryl D. Esakof,

Radiology practices and education

Usually the sharing of echocardiographic information involves the dissemination of printed reports that detail anatomic findings, typically organized by chamber or valve. Enhancement of reports with illustrative still-frame pictures is feasible with equipment to digitize cardiac ultrasound images. However, allowing referring physicians and trainees to see actual dynamic echocardiographic studies requires either retrieving and playing a videotape or finding a workstation capable of displaying digital images, assuming that digital imaging capability exists in a given laboratory. There now is a new modality for sharing echocardiographic studies with colleagues outside the echocardiography laboratory in the form of the personal digital assistant (PDA). Recent PDA processor upgrades make it possible to show video at a high frame rate on screens with fine resolution. Recent releases of PDAs using the Palm operating system are particularly well-suited to this task, together with inexpensive software and standard out-of-the-box desktop computer equipment. The large memory capacity of removable storage media makes possible the transfer of edited echocardiographic movies to the PDA. Hardware that works well to this end include the Sony Clie TG-50 PDA with 16 MB of built-in RAM and a 128-MB memory stick (or a comparable Palm Tungsten model), any Apple computer with a G4 processor (or comparable PC platform), and a Hollywood Dazzle Firewire or USB video digitizer for converting analog video from a VCR to Quicktime video. The Dazzle device or similar analog video digitizer is unnecessary if using a digital echocardiography system capable of exporting video clips. Necessary software includes Apple iMovie video editing software (or Windows equivalent) and Kinoma Producer for conversion of Quicktime movies into a compressed format for viewing on a PDA (available in both Macintosh and Windows). This software automatically customizes the movie specifications for each Palm OS PDA model. Capture from videotape, editing, export, and conversion of a typical 45-second movie (approximately 3-MB file size with 15 frames/s, 320 × 216 pixels/frame with color) takes 10 minutes or less once familiar with the software. Inclusion of sound in the video on the PDA is an option. Conversion of edited echocardiographic movies to a PDA-based format provides an opportunity to show key features of echocardiograms to referring physicians and cardiac surgeons outside the echocardiography laboratory. A library of echocardiographic movies in the PDA provides a unique resource for teaching residents and medical students. Of note, the PDA also can act as a repository of a large collection of still echocardiographic and anatomic images, available for reference and teaching purposes. No doubt, as the processing power of PDA devices continues to grow, the potential applications in echocardiography will expand, perhaps at some point to actual ultrasound image acquisition.