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Informatics in Radiology (infoRAD)

Survey of Personal Digital Assistant Use in Radiology¹

¹ From the Department of Radiology, University of Pennsylvania Health System, 3400 Spruce St, Philadelphia, PA 19104 (W.W.B.); and the Department of Radiology, Thomas Jefferson University Hospital, Philadelphia, Pa (A.E.F.). Presented as an infoRAD exhibit at the 2003 RSNA Scientific Assembly. Received August 26, 2004; accepted October 1. W.W.B. is president of MedicalPocketPC.com; A.E.F. has no financial relationships to disclose. Address correspondence to W.W.B. (e-mail: william.boonn{at}uphs.upenn.edu).

There has been widespread adoption of personal digital assistants (PDAs) within medicine in recent years. However, information on the prevalence and usage of these devices among radiologists is limited. A survey was designed and mailed to randomly selected members of the Radiological Society of North America to determine the percentage of PDA users, their use patterns, and the types of applications that they would like to see in the future. The use patterns of attending radiologists were compared with those of trainees (residents and fellows). Overall usage was also compared with the relevant findings in two surveys of internal medicine users. It was found that slightly less than one-half of respondents used PDAs on a daily basis, a finding that was comparable to that in the internal medicine surveys. However, less than one-quarter of PDA users had radiology-specific applications installed on their devices, whereas a greater percentage of internal medicine users had software such as drug databases and clinical references on their PDAs. Radiology trainees had a higher rate of both PDA ownership and radiology application usage than did attending radiologists. It is likely that, as PDA hardware becomes more powerful, with higher display resolution, better wireless networking capabilities, and greater memory capacity, PDA ownership as well as radiology application usage will increase.

© RSNA, 2005

Abbreviations: ACP = American College of Physicians, ASIM = American Society of Internal Medicine, PACS = picture archiving and communication system, PDA = personal digital assistant, RIS = radiology information system

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