QUEBEC CITY, Quebec and MARKHAM, Ontario, Sept. 28 /CNW/ -- The Agence de la sante et des services sociaux de Montreal has signed a five-year, C$3.6 million deal with Artefact Informatique, the health division of LGS Group Inc., an IBM (NYSE: IBM) company - the first of its kind in Canada - to build a registry for digital medical images based on the Canada-wide Cross-enterprise Document Sharing (XDS) standard.
With the new tool, Quebec physicians will have quick electronic access to the millions of X-rays, MRIs and other medical images stored annually in three secure digital imaging repositories across the province.
"The registry will enable Quebec family doctors to better serve their patients," said Raymond Carrier, project manager, ministere de la Sante et des Services sociaux du Quebec. "Medical professionals can search for, access and view digital images from their offices, regardless of where or how originals are stored. This is the final step that will lead to a comprehensive medical imaging domain solution as part of the Quebec EHR plan."
To use the tool, doctors will access IBM's Cross-enterprise Document Sharing Integration (XDS-I) registry to view a list of all images on file for their patient. By clicking on an item, the IBM solution will provide a link or point to wherever the images are stored, in one of three digital imaging repositories the province maintains.
Radiologists will also be able to share the workload by gaining access to remote images. This will accelerate diagnosis in regions where radiologists are in short supply.
The new registry is expected to be available in 2010. Currently, family physicians in Quebec have no electronic access to digital images for their patients, and instead must source the physical X-ray or image itself directly from the radiologist - images that can go missing in transit or not arrive at all.
The registry conforms to the XDS-I Profile being promoted by Canada Health Infoway. Since it is based on open industry standards, it is compatible with other Electronic Health Record (EHR) components. Using open standards for EHR will allow for quicker integration and adoption of a system that will ultimately lead to better decision-making for clinicians and better healthcare for patients.
"Quebec is the first province to adopt the XDS-I standard as a province-wide solution for medical images," said Louise Beauchesne, executive regional director for Canada Health Infoway, Quebec region. "It is the goal of Canada Health Infoway to ensure that secure, remote access to electronic health records leads to better healthcare for Canadians."
Last year, IBM announced the creation of a Centre of Excellence at Artefact Informatique to facilitate the sharing of critical medical documents between physicians, clinics and hospitals.
"IBM Canada has worldwide responsibility for the development and support of this industry-leading registry that is being implemented in the Province of Quebec," said Barry Burk, vice president, Healthcare Industry, IBM Canada. "Under Diane Bouchard's leadership, the Artefact Informatique team is deploying this solution which will enable better access to information and improved patient care."
As the exclusive global provider of the solution, Artefact Informatique, a division of LGS Group Inc., an IBM company, is responsible for the evolution of the product as well as the customization, support and integration services. In collaboration with IBM researchers, Artefact Informatique developed the tool that is the core of this IT solution chosen by the Quebec government.
For more information about the ministere de la Sante et des Services sociaux, please visit www.msss.gouv.qc.ca
For more information about the Agence de la sante et des services sociaux de Montreal, please visit www.santemontreal.qc.ca.
For more information about IBM Healthcare, visit www.ibm.com/industries/healthcare.
Media Contacts:
Mike Boden Daniele Frechette
IBM Media Relations Dossier de sante du Quebec
416-478-7117 514-597-2058 #5965
mboden@ca.ibm.com Danielle.Frechette@msss.gouv.qc.ca
For further information: Mike Boden of IBM Media Relations, +1-416-478-7117, mboden@ca.ibm.com or Daniele Frechette of Dossier de sante du Quebec, +1-514-597-2058 #5965, Danielle.Frechette@msss.gouv.qc.ca Web Site: http://www.ibm.com
Monday, September 28, 2009
Monday, September 14, 2009
The ‘Big 3’ – GE, Philips and Siemens – continue to enjoy provider loyalty
But other vendors and new innovations are shaking up the imaging market
OREM, Utah – Sept. 9, 2009 – While a third of healthcare providers plan to continue a freeze on all imaging equipment purchases in the midst of a tough economy, many more are once again looking to buy, with magnetic resonance (MR) equipment topping the list of planned purchases.
Modality buying decisions are the subject of a new report from KLAS, titled Diagnostic Imaging Equipment: Which Vendors are Positioned to Win? For the study, KLAS interviewed 147 healthcare provider organizations to find out which imaging vendors they’re considering in a variety of categories.
The report notes that providers most frequently mentioned MR systems as a planned purchase over the next 24 months; and Siemens and Toshiba are generating the most buzz in that market thanks to the success of their wide-bore MR equipment.
“Providers have gravitated to wide-bore MR systems for their high-quality imaging plus the increased comfort they offer claustrophobic and bariatric patients,” said Kirk Ising, KLAS research director for medical imaging and medical equipment and author of the new report. “Siemens and Toshiba have clearly set the pace in that arena, while GE and Philips have actually lost business because of their lack of wide-bore MR offerings.”
After MR, respondents most frequently mentioned purchase plans for ultrasound, computed tomography (CT), digital mammography, and then digital x-ray (DR).
In the CT market, GE maintains the lead in mindshare, with 68 percent of providers planning to include the vendor in their purchase decisions. The next most-considered vendor was Siemens, followed by Toshiba and Philips. Toshiba’s position in the CT market has been boosted by the introduction of its Aquilion ONE CT, which has gotten the attention of some research-heavy hospitals that typically disregarded Toshiba in the past.
Another intriguing market segment is digital x-ray. While GE, Siemens and Philips remain the top three vendors in provider mindshare in DR, Carestream is also turning heads with the introduction of its DRX-1 product, a cassette-sized wireless detector. “Many providers indicated they would consider Carestream in DR buying decisions because of the DRX-1,” Ising said.
Taken together, GE, Siemens and Philips garnered the most mentions from providers across the six market segments highlighted in Diagnostic Imaging Equipment: Which Vendors are Positioned to Win?, maintaining the “Big 3” of imaging equipment status that has earned all three companies significant loyalty among providers. Despite this strong position, however, the KLAS report also mentions that companies like Shimadzu and Toshiba, along with Carestream, FUJIFILM and Konica Minolta, have been attracting some clients away from the top vendors because of solid technology and outstanding service.
Vendors profiled in the new KLAS report include Agfa, Carestream, FUJIFILM, GE, Hitachi, Hologic, Konica Minolta, Philips, Siemens and Toshiba.
To learn more about the medical imaging equipment market, as well as healthcare provider perceptions about leading vendors, the report Diagnostic Imaging Equipment: Which Vendors are Positioned to Win? is available to healthcare providers online for a significant discount off the standard retail price. To purchase the full report, healthcare providers and vendors can visit www.KLASresearch.com/reports.
OREM, Utah – Sept. 9, 2009 – While a third of healthcare providers plan to continue a freeze on all imaging equipment purchases in the midst of a tough economy, many more are once again looking to buy, with magnetic resonance (MR) equipment topping the list of planned purchases.
Modality buying decisions are the subject of a new report from KLAS, titled Diagnostic Imaging Equipment: Which Vendors are Positioned to Win? For the study, KLAS interviewed 147 healthcare provider organizations to find out which imaging vendors they’re considering in a variety of categories.
The report notes that providers most frequently mentioned MR systems as a planned purchase over the next 24 months; and Siemens and Toshiba are generating the most buzz in that market thanks to the success of their wide-bore MR equipment.
“Providers have gravitated to wide-bore MR systems for their high-quality imaging plus the increased comfort they offer claustrophobic and bariatric patients,” said Kirk Ising, KLAS research director for medical imaging and medical equipment and author of the new report. “Siemens and Toshiba have clearly set the pace in that arena, while GE and Philips have actually lost business because of their lack of wide-bore MR offerings.”
After MR, respondents most frequently mentioned purchase plans for ultrasound, computed tomography (CT), digital mammography, and then digital x-ray (DR).
In the CT market, GE maintains the lead in mindshare, with 68 percent of providers planning to include the vendor in their purchase decisions. The next most-considered vendor was Siemens, followed by Toshiba and Philips. Toshiba’s position in the CT market has been boosted by the introduction of its Aquilion ONE CT, which has gotten the attention of some research-heavy hospitals that typically disregarded Toshiba in the past.
Another intriguing market segment is digital x-ray. While GE, Siemens and Philips remain the top three vendors in provider mindshare in DR, Carestream is also turning heads with the introduction of its DRX-1 product, a cassette-sized wireless detector. “Many providers indicated they would consider Carestream in DR buying decisions because of the DRX-1,” Ising said.
Taken together, GE, Siemens and Philips garnered the most mentions from providers across the six market segments highlighted in Diagnostic Imaging Equipment: Which Vendors are Positioned to Win?, maintaining the “Big 3” of imaging equipment status that has earned all three companies significant loyalty among providers. Despite this strong position, however, the KLAS report also mentions that companies like Shimadzu and Toshiba, along with Carestream, FUJIFILM and Konica Minolta, have been attracting some clients away from the top vendors because of solid technology and outstanding service.
Vendors profiled in the new KLAS report include Agfa, Carestream, FUJIFILM, GE, Hitachi, Hologic, Konica Minolta, Philips, Siemens and Toshiba.
To learn more about the medical imaging equipment market, as well as healthcare provider perceptions about leading vendors, the report Diagnostic Imaging Equipment: Which Vendors are Positioned to Win? is available to healthcare providers online for a significant discount off the standard retail price. To purchase the full report, healthcare providers and vendors can visit www.KLASresearch.com/reports.
Monday, September 7, 2009
Hospitals Want to Avoid Getting ‘Locked In’ as They Consider Enterprise Imaging Solutions
New KLAS report explores which vendors providers are considering most for enterprise imaging
OREM, Utah – July 27, 2009 – Many hospitals are considering new vendor-neutral solutions for archiving and accessing medical images in order to avoid being locked in to closed, proprietary software, according to a new report from KLAS.
In Enterprise Imaging: A Vendor Reality Check, KLAS examines the enterprise imaging (EI) market – which aims to deliver access to medical images across hospital departments – and explores the vendor solutions healthcare providers are considering most. The study found that while many providers are looking to their picture archiving and communication system (PACS) vendor as a likely EI partner, they also recognize the potential pitfalls of getting locked into a proprietary solution that may not translate well from one department to another.
“Traditional PACS vendors like Philips, GE, McKesson and FUJIFILM were frequently mentioned by providers as likely candidates for an EI solution,” said Ben Brown, general manager of imaging informatics for KLAS and author of the new EI report. “But those same providers were also adamant that they want to own their image data and not leave it hostage to the PACS vendor.
“A number of hospitals are beginning to take ownership of their medical images by building PACS-neutral archives and storage management layers,” Brown said. “This approach allows the PACS to simply become a physician-friendly viewing and interaction layer that can be upgraded or replaced without the typically painful migration.”
Outside of PACS, many providers also referenced storage and archive solution vendors, such as EMC, IBM and HP, as potential EI partners. Each of those companies has partnered with middleware vendors – EMC with Acuo and IBM and HP with Bycast – to deliver vendor-neutral archive products that federate data from DICOM application or storage layers. Similar solutions from DeJarnette and TeraMedica also enjoy some mindshare with providers. In addition, as the amount of imaging data being archived continues to grow, some providers have looked to outsource their archive and image management to companies like GE, InSite One and Philips.
In total, Philips was the most frequently mentioned EI vendor, followed by GE, McKesson, EMC, FUJIFILM, Agfa, IBM, Siemens, AMICAS (Emageon) and HP. Philips, in particular, poses interesting questions for providers. As the vendor most frequently associated with enterprise imaging, Philips owns tremendous mindshare in the imaging space, offering widely deployed solutions in PACS, cardiology PACS and other areas. At the same time, Philips had the highest number of clients report the possibility of replacing its cardiology solution, and the company’s cardiology strategy has been criticized for being somewhat confusing and fragmented.
The KLAS report notes that while radiology, nuclear medicine and cardiology enjoy significant adoption of digital imaging management, other departments such as oncology, endoscopy and pathology are still fairly immature in their use of the technology. Among those, digital pathology brings with it a number of unique challenges, including enormous data sets that can adversely affect image distribution and transfer speeds. Some industry experts estimate that pathology images represent a larger data volume than all other imaging specialties combined.
To learn more about the enterprise imaging market, as well as the strengths and weaknesses of participating vendors, the report Enterprise Imaging: A Vendor Reality Check is available to healthcare providers online for a significant discount off the standard retail price. To purchase the full report, healthcare providers and vendors can visit www.KLASresearch.com.
Thursday, September 3, 2009
Health Information Technology Extension Program: Regional Centers Cooperative Agreement Program
September 3, 2009
Health Information Technology Extension Program: Regional Centers Cooperative Agreement Program Update
The Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC) is pleased to announce the availability of materials that are of immediate interest and use to stakeholders and potential applicants for the Health Information Technology Extension Program: Regional Centers Cooperative Agreement Program, and that are new or updated since the August 27, 2009 technical assistance telephone and web conference.
REVISED – Preliminary Application Template (Attachment I to the Funding Opportunity Announcement): As discussed on the August 27th technical assistance public conference, the suggested template for applicants’ use in compiling and presenting the information required for the Preliminary Application has been updated to include the complete requirements established in the funding opportunity announcement and is now available from www.grants.gov and the Extension Program section of ONC’s website at http://healthit.hhs.gov/extensionprogram.
NEW – A complete transcript of the August 27th technical assistance conference is available for download from the Extension Program section of ONC’s website. Please visit http://healthit.hhs.gov/extensionprogram to access detailed information about the conference, including the transcript and the presentation slides used during the call.
NEW/REVISED – Program-specific Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) are now available on the Extension Program section of ONC’s website. New FAQs are posted frequently, so potential applicants and other interested parties are encouraged to visit often. Please visit http://healthit.hhs.gov/extensionprogram then scroll down and click on “Frequently Asked Questions”.
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