However, processing large data volumes is not the only challenge for today’s workstations. While more – and better – imaging data brings obvious benefits, it also has triggered the need for powerful viewing and postprocessing workstations that allow fast and multidimensional access to high-resolution volumetric data sets. New scanning and measurement devices capture up to 1,000 times more data than in previous generations. Imaging data is seeing rapid growth in both volume and complexity. In addition, four PACS department servers, each from a different solution vendor, support data buffering and image distribution. Eighty image visualisation and postprocessing workstations handle the 40 TB of image data stored by a central picture archiving and communication system (PACS).

Radiology staff rely on approximately 150 radiology information system (RIS) workstations to access patient data to plan and report examinations. The Department of Clinical Radiology oversees most of the hospital’s radiological practice, from conventional radiology, computed tomography (CT), magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), pediatric radiology and interventional radiology to nuclear medicine and neuroradiology. Approximately 4,500 employees care for nearly 300,000 in- and outpatients each year. The hospital has 18 clinical departments (including surgery, internal medicine, ophthalmology and gynaecology) and 12 departments for diagnostics and research. The University Hospital of Mannheim is a medical faculty affiliated to the University of Heidelberg in southwest Germany.

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