VNA to manage pathology and radiology data

TORONTO – St. Michael’s Hospital is conducting a trial of Carestream’s new Clinical Collaboration Platform, which enables providers to manage and share multi-format clinical data – including photographs and more structured, diagnostic images – to help clinicians make decisions.

The focus of the project is to capture and manage native pathology images within a Carestream vendor neutral archive (VNA), and enable easy access to this information by dermatologists and other clinicians on mobile devices using Carestream’s Vue Motion universal viewer.

“As a teaching hospital we often see patients with complex conditions. Our ultimate goal is to find new ways to enhance patient care. Viewing high-resolution photographic images of skin tumors or rashes is an important integrative clinical tool, and being able to see digital microscopic images of a biopsy by a treating clinician can also play an important role in diagnosis,” said Dr. Victor Tron (pictured), Chief and Medical Director of Laboratory Medicine, St. Michael’s Hospital.

“We want to use this new platform to create an efficient workflow that makes these images readily available within the patient record from the EMR.”

Dr. Tron noted that clinical and pathology images are currently stored in systems that are limited to certain users. “We want to be equipped to share diagnostic information efficiently with all diagnostic and treating clinicians who need to make critical clinical decisions. Integrating other types of clinical images could also offer diagnostic benefits.”

Carestream’s Clinical Collaboration Platform can be deployed as modules within a provider’s existing IT ecosystem. The latest interoperability standards incorporated into the Clinical Collaboration Platform allow data to be aggregated to create a more holistic view of the patient record, which is accessible from any location.

“Carestream’s flexible Clinical Collaboration Platform can complement existing departmental systems. It offers a modular approach to bring unstructured data – including endoscopy, dermatology, pathology, cardiology and lab results – into the clinical workflow. The platform enables delivery of additional images and reports to clinicians for quality patient care,” said Ludovic D’Aprea, Carestream’s General Manager for Healthcare Information Solutions.

Modules for Carestream’s Clinical Collaboration Platform deliver these capabilities:
• A web-based, zero-footprint data ingestion module that enables advanced discovery, reconciliation, tagging and ingestion of unstructured clinical data;
• Physicians can access a patient’s clinical history including images, video, waveforms and reports from FDA-approved mobile devices using Carestream’s Vue Motion universal viewer. Carestream’s viewer supports XDS-I consumer workflow including DICOMweb services such as WADO RS;
• An optional patient portal enables image exchange allowing registered patients to view, download, share and manage their own clinical data; and
• A real-time business dashboard module addresses healthcare IT executives’ need for more intelligent data analytics to help streamline operations and compliance.

These capabilities build upon Carestream’s standards-based, vendor neutral archive infrastructure. InMedica, a division of IMS research, has recognized Carestream as one of the largest suppliers of vendor-neutral archiving in the world.

To view information about Carestream systems being demonstrated at RSNA please visit www.carestream.com/rsna.

About Carestream Health
Carestream is a worldwide provider of dental and medical imaging systems and IT solutions; X-ray imaging systems for non-destructive testing; and advanced materials for the precision films and electronics markets – all backed by a global service and support network. For more information about the company’s broad portfolio of products, solutions and services, please contact your Carestream representative or call 888-777-2072, or visit www.carestream.com.