Integration of particular equipment into current or future department workow should be considered. Some manufacturers and models will integrate better with par­ticular electronic health records and image management systems (including both “mid­dleware” or a more traditional picture archival and communication service—PACS). It may be very helpful to discuss machine integration with someone who uses a similar workow, and vendors are often able to provide prospective customers with these refer­ences. Patient demographics should be available for selection from a work list and convenient to enter manually if needed. Some companies have enabled automatic trans­fer of patient information to their machines using a patient identity band barcode reader. The ability to select a patient without manual entry facilitates correct documentation for electronic medical record transfer and quality assurance [3]. Likewise, “ending an exam” facilitates image storage and the ability to create a new patient. Most systems will do this automatically, but a cumbersome process will hinder workow. The pro­spective buyer should think carefully about how images will be stored and transferred from the machine and if possible discuss with someone using a similar conguration. Some ultrasound companies are now interfacing with middleware documentation com­panies to allow the completion of interpretation worksheets on their machines. This enhances operator compliance with documentation and speeds workow.