I gave a tour through the hospital for all the new radiography students the other day. I first took them down to the huge x-ray archives in the basement. Of course it's locked, which brings to mind the increased importance of patient privacy laws. The archives are also thinning down as each year passes since we went to PACS. This shows real change made by our use of technology. But the fact that struck me was how the x-rays that we take are part of a patient's record and in some cases (legal, for example) are not "ever" destroyed. An x-ray that you took several years ago may be pulled for reinterpretation. Your best and worst work doesn't really disappear after they are first read by a radiologist. I'm not sure if the typical seventh year (now they are purging 1999) will be applied to PACS. What do you think?
1 comments:
Hi! So nice to find another x-ray blogger!
At my two previous hospitals we purged 7 years, but where I work now, until last year, they had NEVER purged. Never.
We threw away films from the early 60's and lots of people with birthdates from the 1880's!
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