COMPUTER PROCESSING OF NEURORADIOLOGICAL REPORTS. AN INTRODUCTION TO THE APPLICATION OF THE VARIABLE-FIELD-LENGTH FORMAT AND MEDTRAN.

Advances in the application of computer technology to medicine have been proceeding at an ever-increasing rate (2–6, 12–18, 21). This report deals with a technic that the authors have recently applied to radiology. The method combines routine dictation and typing of patients' radiological reports utilizing a special, commercially available typewriter. This typewriter will simultaneously prepare the material in the form of hard copy for routine use, and punch paper tape which is in machine language for computer input, storage, and analysis. The procedure was adapted from a previously described program of computer processing of neurological and neurosurgical case summaries (10, 11). The technic is now being routinely applied to neuroradiology reports of special procedures such as pneumoencephalography, ventriculography, angiography, and myelography performed at University Hospital and Bellevue Hospital of the New York University Medical Center. The purpose of adopting this process is to take full advantage ...