The Quirón Group of Hospitals in Spain has significantly improved workflows after implementing the Carestream Health Picture Archiving and Communications System (PACS) and Radiology Information System (RIS).

In February 2007, the group decided it needed to access historical and current patient records, images and reports relating to patients exams online. It also needed to reduce administrative time spent of producing reports and minimise errors and repeat examinations.

The hospitals also wanted to make the administrative process such as booking appointments in medical examination procedures paperless.

The group implemented Carestream’s RIS/PACS solution across five of its private hospitals inBarcelona, San Sebastián, Madrid, Valencia and Saragossa.

It integrated the solution with other information systems across the group to provide enhanced capabilities for diagnostic reporting such as voice recognition.

According to the hospital, since the implementation the Quirón Group has seen a reduction in the number of diagnostic errors, better collaboration between clinical stage and the image diagnostic department.

The implementation has also resulted in a reduction in the time that each patient spends at the hospital as a result of instant access to reports and a reduction in the administrative processes needed for the preparation of reports.

Dr Vincente Martinez de Vega, head of diagnostic imaging, Quirón Hospital Madrid, said: “We are using Carestream Health Solutions in more than 80% of our projects, which is a huge advantage for our radiology team and for the clinics of the hospital.”

He told E-Health Europe: “More than 90,000 studies per year are stored in 2.5 TB. The group is proud of having such a technologically advanced radiology system, whose main beneficiary is the patient.

“Working with Carestream Health RIS/PACS solutions means that the work carried out is of an excellent quality. Thanks to Carestream Health we have managed to reduce diagnostic errors and avoid doing unnecessary or repeat exams.”

The PACS/RIS will be rolled out in two more Quirón Group hospitals in Bilbao and Malaga when they open at the end of the year.

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