Settlement of Virtual Slide in South Korea
Woo Young Jang MD; Hangang Sacred Heart Hospital, Hallym University;
Content:
Virtual slide is a very powerful and useful tool for diagnosis and education of pathology. But, expensive hardware and big size of data interrupt the settlement of virtual slide in Korea. The Korean Society for Cytopathology decided to make a paradigm shift. We make several steps for settlement. The first is giving some information and experience about the virtual slide to the members. We link the virtual slide samples on our homepage. (http://www.cytopathol.com) The second is making free virtual slide server and giving a free virtual slide service for members. (http://www.digitalpathology.co.kr) The last is making a pathology database and web control program of virtual slide to perform of Quality Insurance and Teaching Samples for medical students, residents, and fellows. The high quality infrastructure of 100Mbps internet makes smooth up and download of large data. We already prepare the budget and will finish this project till summer of 2008.
Technology:
Virtual slide machine, Pentium 4 computer system (include free voice chatting system), Server and 100Mbps internet line were used for the construction of this system.
Design:
This system was designed for time & money saving, accurate, clear vision consultation-conference-teaching. We set this system at rent server and give a public notice to all members. The Virtual slide machine was installed at server and connected with 100Mbps internet line. The control software was installed on the server. Every pathologists who installed the free viewer software to their Pentium 4 computer system, started download the virtual slide and exchange their opinion about the case, using monitor and voice chatting system. When they reached agreement, they could take high quality pictures.
Results:
Virtual slide machine made possible to get the excellent conference, teaching and high quality of pictures.
Conclusion:
Virtual slide machine system had the following advantages: 1) Easy handling of viewer 2) High resolution image quality 3) Easy to get snapshot 4) Discussion using voice chatting software
