From teleconsultations to availability of health related databases, the effect of using high performance computing and communications will enhance patient care, improve drug design, and broaden access to medical information. Biochemists, computer scientists, and computational chemists combine rational drug design methods with virtual reality and video teleconferencing technology to evaluate potential drugs for Chagas disease and related parasitic illnesses. Real-time imaging is also a growing capability in many medical centers, allowing physicians to use scientific visualization techniques to address health care problems. Distant clinical teleconsultation is possible through a project that uses wide area communications supported by an infrastructure that incorporates local and remote storage.
Standard interfaces allow multiple systems to collaborate in image acquisition and storage.
The health care industry is actively engaged in using HPCC technology. Over 170 U.S. medical schools and health care facilities have been connected during the past three years. Analytic studies and the development of computer-based systems are also studied to promote the widespread transmission and use of medical records and clinical images in patient care. The Visible Human data sets, consisting of images from a male cadaver and a female cadaver, have been completed. The larger, long-term goal is to produce a system of knowledge structures to form symbolic knowledge formats.