Method and apparatus for transmission and storage of digital medical data

An apparatus for distributing medical data between geographically separate locations connected by optical, wired or radio frequency data paths of limited bandwidth, the apparatus employed at a first one of the locations comprising:

• a processing device;
• a memory device coupled to said processing device;
• at least one network interface connected to at least one of said data paths and in communication with said processing device;
• wherein said processing device is programmable
• to separate said medical data provided to its corresponding said location into bulk content and metadata, to associate said bulk content with a content identifier,
• to select said locations to which said bulk content is to be transmitted
• (a) based on a calculation utilizing
• at least one factor selected from the group consisting of the desired degree of content duplication, storage capacity available at each of said locations, geographic distance to each of said locations, transmission cost to each of said locations, data path bandwidth to each location, current utilization of the data paths to each of said locations, processor utilization at each of said locations, and
• the likelihood of retrieval at each of said locations, said likelihood being calculated using at least one of information contained in said metadata, from requests to use said bulk content, prior usage of said bulk content, from information obtained from a system that manages patients' appointments, and from information obtained from a system that manages uses of said bulk content, and
• (b) selecting optimal ones of said locations by calculating the relative ranking of at least two of said locations using at least one of said factor and said likelihood of retrieval, wherein which of said locations are optimal can change over time, updating which of said locations are selected as optimal, and transmitting via said at least one network interface said bulk content to the selected said optimal locations for storage,
• to extend said metadata to comprise said content identifier and a list of all of said locations where said bulk content has been transmitted for storage, and
• to transmit via said at least one network interface said extended metadata to at least one of said locations for storage;
• wherein said relative ranking is determined by calculating a score for each of said locations based on a weighted sum wherein weights are selected and multiplied by values obtained from at least one of said factor and said likelihood of retrieval.