Medical imaging experienced profound advancements in the 19th and 20th century. CT scans create computerized, 360-degree images of the human body in incredible detail within minutes. However, hospital systems struggle to find solutions for storing such vast amounts of data in HIPAA-compliant ways. And, sharing relevant medical imaging data with practitioners, insurance entities, and most importantly, patients across different operating systems, programs, file types, and levels of digital literacy challenges workflows.

Every type of medical imaging—including X-rays, CT scans, MRIs, and ultrasounds—relies on a different technology to create the image, but the end result is the same: a digital file. As technology in the medical field has grown by leaps and bounds, allowing for increasingly sophisticated medical imaging, so has the number of digital image files.

Medical imaging stores for many healthcare systems have reached hundreds of terabytes, and in many cases, petabytes. By some estimates, 30 percent of the world’s data is from healthcare, and 90 percent is from medical imaging. Hospital systems struggle to find solutions for storing such vast amounts of data in HIPAA-compliant ways. And, sharing relevant medical imaging data with practitioners, insurance entities, and most importantly, patients—all across different operating systems, programs, file types, and levels of digital literacy—challenges workflows.

But now there is a solution.

Amazon Web Services (AWS) and our partners solved image management in the cloud with four primary pillars that work in unison to benefit the healthcare system and its patients. In this eBook, dive deep on the AWS solution for storing and sharing medical images that transformed how healthcare systems deliver patient care.