Thirty-two-bit fat clients have hit the wall: Consequences for TRIP ^™

In its 2003 Annual meeting, the Society of Computer Applications in Radiology launched the Transforming the Radiologist Interpretation Process (TRIP ^™) initiative. As described at the time, TRIP ^™ is intended to assist radiologists with the tsunami of exploding data sets that they are increasingly expected to interpret. TRIP ^™ initially focused on three high level strategic objectives: 1. Improving efficiency of interpretation of large data sets, 2. Improving the timeliness and effectiveness of communication, and 3. Decreasing medical errors. However, there is a fundamental consideration that must presage the above concerns. Namely, will the computer architectures used even be capable of swallowing the data torrent that is pointed at them?