What Does a PACS Analyst Do?

If you work in digital health and you’re looking for a role that offers real job security and can be the starting point for a successful career, one of the lob titles that’s got to show up in your planning is PACS analyst. But is it the right role for you? What does a PACS Analyst do?

What Does a PACS Analyst Do: Breaking It Down
As a general rule, PACS jobs are on the increase. There is some overlap in responsibilities and skills between the different job titles, as organisations will often engage one specialist whose experience is most relevant to the core task they want, but who’ll become “the PACS person”, handling any other duties that might come up.

Many long-term PACS analysts will be no stranger to this, as the role tends to be a permanent position. In a smaller organisation, a PACS department may be a department of just one or two who have to resolve any issues as well as doing the important work required for the PACS.

However, their primary skillsets are going to be in analysis and in reporting. Data collection and analysis allow processes around PACS to be optimised and help the organisation as a whole to provide top-quality service.

To make the most of this analysis, the results have to be clearly communicated to all relevant personnel. ‘Clearly’ here means ‘in a way they can easily understand’, which will vary depending on your audience.

If there is no PACS administrator in your organisation, one of the groups you’ll be presenting to will be your organisation’s board or C-Suite. This is a very different to a report for another technical team.

A good PACS analyst will learn what information is needed by which groups and will develop skills in presenting that information so that it’s quickly and easily understood.

You’ll also need to be able to do basic troubleshooting and maintenance for your PACS system of choice.

In smaller PACS teams there may be many other side requirements, but these will form the focus for most.