Agfa HealthCare has signed a new three-year agreement with The Mid Yorkshire Hospitals NHS Trust for its picture archiving and communication system (PACS) extended with a high availability, vendor-neutral Enterprise Imaging platform. The contract was signed at the end of 2014, and implementation began in May 2015.
Long-term archiving solution for busy Trust
The 1047-bed Mid Yorkshire Hospitals NHS Trust serves a population of around half a million people living in the Wakefield and North Kirklees districts of West Yorkshire. It has three main hospitals - Pinderfields in Wakefield, Dewsbury and District Hospital and Pontefract. Every day, the hospitals treat about 600 people in the emergency services; some 1300 outpatients pass through the hospital each day.
The Trust has an enterprise-wide Agfa HealthCare PACS system, and has been a 'filmless' imaging environment since 2006. As part of a three-year extension of its contract with Agfa HealthCare, the hospital has decided to implement a high availability Enterprise Imaging solution with a vendor-neutral archive (VNA), to create a long-term archiving solution. All data in the PACS archive will be moved to the VNA.
"Leave no image behind"
Agfa HealthCare's Enterprise Imaging platform is a comprehensive enterprise-class imaging clinical information system that puts all images, captured anywhere in the hospital, on a single platform. It supports hospitals to free medical images and information from departmental information silos, allowing them to be meaningfully captured, stored and exchanged.
One consolidated view for no-barriers imaging
The solution will also include the zero-footprint XERO Viewer, which enables healthcare professionals to view images securely with only a commonly-used Internet browser and a modest network connection. In this way, it provides "anytime, anywhere" access to imaging data from different departments and multiple sources, in one view, to anyone who needs it.
A partner for life
"Working with a single supplier offers us a number of benefits, including ensuring that service delivery meets our needs," says Tom Scott, IT Project Manager - PACS, The Mid Yorkshire Hospitals NHS Trust. "Our experience with Agfa HealthCare has already shown us that they have the flexible, integrated, quality solutions we need, combined with excellent service. So we are confident that this decision will support us in achieving our goals for maximizing the value of our images, and for enhancing collaboration and patient care."
"We are delighted that The Mid Yorkshire Hospitals NHS Trust has decided not only to extend their contract with us, strengthening our ongoing relationship, but to take it even further, towards Enterprise Imaging," says Grant Witheridge, General Manager of Agfa HealthCare UK. "Enterprise Imaging will support the Trust in improving collaboration across disciplines and 'imaging rich' departments, reducing administrative costs and increasing operational efficiency; all while 'leaving no image behind'."
Related news articles:
- Agfa HealthCare's Profile
About Agfa
The Agfa-Gevaert Group is one of the world's leading companies in imaging and information technology. Agfa develops manufactures and markets analogue and digital systems for the printing industry (Agfa Graphics), for the healthcare sector (Agfa HealthCare), and for specific industrial applications (Agfa Materials). Agfa is headquartered in Mortsel, Belgium. The company is present in 40 countries and has agents in another 100 countries around the globe. The Agfa-Gevaert Group achieved a turnover of 2,865 million euro in 2013.
About Agfa HealthCare
Agfa HealthCare, a member of the Agfa-Gevaert Group, is a leading global provider of diagnostic imaging and healthcare IT solutions. The company has nearly a century of healthcare experience and has been a pioneer on the healthcare IT market since the early 1990's. Today Agfa HealthCare designs, develops and delivers state-of-the-art systems for capturing, managing and processing diagnostic images and clinical/administrative information for hospitals and healthcare facilities, as well as contrast media solutions to enable effective medical imaging results. The company has sales offices and agents in over 100 markets worldwide. Sales for Agfa HealthCare in 2013 were 1,160 million euro.