Carestream signs Dutch RIS deal

Carestream Health has been awarded a contract to supply a new radiology information system to eight departments at the University Medical Centre Groningen in the Netherlands following a competitive European tender process.

The hospital, which is one of the largest in the Netherlands, will implement the RIS in December to interface with its existing Rogan picture archiving and communications system.

The radiology department already carries out more than 180,000 examinations a year; the equivalent of 500 patients every day.

The latest Carestream RIS platform is designed to reduce the complexity of radiology administration and improve workflow by minimising manual intervention.

Accoridng to Carestream, it allows users to tailor the system to individual requirements in order to take advantage of existing workflow efficiencies.

It also allows clinicians to automate the order entry process by entering orders directly through a hospital information system or via secure web communication.

It further includes automatic exam scheduling, monitoring and documentation of patient progress and procedures and a web module to enable secure communications with referring physicians and hospital-based clinicians.

Piet ten Bhomer, head of technical affairs at UMCG, said: "The Carestream RIS gives us the opportunity to structure and control our workflow, which contributes to an improvement in patient care by reducing the time between examination and report.

"This flexible, web-based RIS allows us to personalise the system, such as work lists for our radiologists.”

The win means that Carestream’s products are now present in all hospitals within the Provence of Groningen after Stichting Samenwerkende Ziekenhuizen signed a RIS/PACS agreement in March 2010 and Martini Hospitals signed a four year deal RIS/PACS deal with the company.

Link: Carestream Health