How do I decide if Blackbird is right for my practice?

Part of the reason why Blackbird is such a cost effective solution is because (unless you are based in South Africa) we do not come on site to give you a demo (or at least not until you have gone through the preliminary stages).

Maintaining the international sales staff needed to perform these demos would, conservatively, double the cost of the RIS and PACS.

Besides, demos are just that, and not necessarily a reflection of what you get in real life.

To try and ensure you can adequately assess if Blackbird is right for your practice before making a major commitment we offer a staged process.

Stage 1

Please review the information on this website including the White Papers.

Download the appropriate demo version of the RIS here.

Review the teaching material here.

Email any queries to info@radiology.co.za but please allow 24 hrs for a reply.

With this information you should be able to decide if you are seriously considering purchase and want to proceed with Stage 2.

Stage 2

Stage 2 is designed for potential clients that, after Stage 1, have decided they probably wish to buy Blackbird, but want to confirm their decision before any major financial commitment.

Stage 2 is also designed to ascertain if the Remote Server option will be appropriate for your practice.

During Stage 2 our software engineers configure a live, multi-user Blackbird system at your practice using remote servers.
Although the system is live, we ask you to use demo data because we do not perform user verification at this stage.
Because this final evaluation process is Blackbird staff and resource intensive, we require a fee of $6 000 (which is credited toward your final purchase if you decide to choose a Blackbird solution) for this 28 day stage.

Why is a fee required for Stage 2 and what does that fee buy?

Stage 2 requires Blackbird to commit staff to your practice for 1 month.

We are assuming that only serious purchasers will progress to Stage 2 and part of this assessment stage is seeing how our technical, training and support staff manage your practice in real life.

To demonstrate this we:

Set up and allow secure access to both a RIS Server and an Archive (BASE) Server, in either the US, Europe or Africa depending on your location.

Configure, up to 5 machines on your local network (for Reception, Radiographer, Radiologist and Typist).

Set up referring doctor web access.

Set up soft phones on each machine and connect them to our internal telephonic network. This allows each user to speak to Blackbird support staff for the duration of the demo.

Offer 4 training courses (Reception, Radiographer, Radiologist and Transcriptionist) and do 4 hrs. of live remote training (using the soft phones and screen sharing).

Besides the fee what else do you need to provide for stage 2

Supply 4 networked computers with internet access (2 Windows Vista boxes, 1 Mac running Leopard and the last box can be another of either).
Gives Blackbird technical staff admin access to those machines. Supply x 2 IP addresses for the Mac and x1 for each of the Windows boxes (we need 2 for the Mac - the second is actually routed via a VPN to the remote archive).

Stage 3

This stage is designed to demonstrate how we manage multiple OsiriX users in an Enterprise environment.

There is no further cost for this stage, but you will need to provide additional computers including at least one Mac Pro and additional IP addresses.

Stage 4

Contract negotiation