Much work, although often fragmentary, has been published by professionals on PACS (picture archiving and communication systems) related issues. This book, however, is unique in its field, providing medical professionals in particular with a state-of-the-art overview of this system. Covering the USA, Western Europe and Japan, it gives an outline of the history, status and future of (digital) medical image handling in the hospital environment during the final two decades of this century (as perceived and experienced by professionals working in this particular field of medicine). It comprises case studies from around the world and, with most of these studies belonging to highly specialized subtopics of the medical imaging area, they provide a good insight into the complexity and problems of the total field. Hence this volume will be invaluable to those in the medical profession, and specifically those with a clear technical interest in medical imaging for daily use in a hospital environment.