McKesson announced the successful deployment of its market-leading medical imaging solution at the first four of 35 hospitals in Ireland as part of an exclusive partnership with the Irish Health Service Executive (HSE). Beaumont Hospital, Mater Misericordiae University Hospital, Sligo General Hospital and Waterford Regional Hospital are amoung the first to roll out McKesson's Horizon Medical Imaging picture archiving communications system (PACS) and radiology imaging system (RIS) as part of HSE's National Integrated Medical Imaging System (NIMIS) initiative.
NIMIS is the world's largest integrated medical imaging project designed to move Ireland to advanced digital technology. Using McKesson's solutions will help ensure that all 3.5 million radiology studies performed each year in Ireland are available to clinicians at any time and in all locations for greater efficiency, safety and more accountable patient care. When NIMIS is complete, Ireland will have one of the most advanced and integrated radiology IT infrastructures in the world.
"PACS and radiology information systems (RIS) are at the heart of the modern radiology department," explained Niall Sheehy, M.D., lead radiologist for NIMIS. "NIMIS will bring PACS/RIS to all public hospitals in Ireland and enable electronic image-sharing between them."
Not only have the hospitals already experienced a significant reduction in radiology report turnaround times - from up to two weeks to 30 minutes - but the project also is the foundation for a national image archive.
Like many countries, Ireland had already begun the steps toward automation. In fact, one quarter of Irish hospitals have a PACS system where images are captured, stored and examined. However, without a centralised architecture, all existing PACS in Ireland acted in isolation with no sharing of images or patient data between facilities. Patients transferred or sent for second opinions required film packets or images stored on CD.
With McKesson's Horizon Medical Imaging, a single solution is being deployed across the country to link all public hospitals and standardise care through a central database that will serve as a national image archive. As a result, when patients are examined at any public hospital or outpatient clinic in Ireland, their entire imaging history will be immediately available to the clinical team, minimising errors and accelerating decision-making.
McKesson also is implementing 3D and advanced visualisation, research tools and electrocardiography for cardiology that integrate with Horizon Medical Imaging. In addition, a voice recognition system will permit immediate digital dictation, transcription and distribution of radiologists’ reports.
"With McKesson and representative hospitals from across Ireland, we invested the time upfront to create a central design methodology that standardised our implementation process," said Neil O'Hare, professor and HSE NIMIS project lead. "This methodology helps to ensure success at each of our go-lives and allowed us to deploy the multiple sites in a short period of time."
In addition to technology, McKesson offers a wide range of industry-leading services designed to help radiologists maximise the value of their image management solutions. For example, its storage service provides full disaster recovery with archiving in a single solution, helping providers eliminate expenses associated with storage, administration costs and hardware obsolescence.
"Imaging deployments can be complex and costly, but that isn't the case with McKesson," added O'Hare. "With McKesson, we get a digital imaging solution that is not just for radiology but includes specialties such as cardiology, vascular surgery, obstetrics and mammography."
McKesson will roll out Horizon Medical Imaging at the remaining hospitals over the next twenty months. Five hospitals in the Northeast region will round out the first phase of implementations. The second phase will include Our Lady's Hospital for Sick Children in Crumlin, Naas General Hospital and St Luke's Hospital in Dublin.
"McKesson has extensive experience in delivering fully-integrated, interoperable solutions to help optimise medical imaging operations and streamline workflow across the care continuum," said Kevan Torgerson, president, Enterprise Medical Imaging, McKesson Provider Technologies. "We are excited to join HSE in bringing the future of healthcare delivery to the people of Ireland."
About the Health Service Executive
The Health Service Executive (HSE) was established in January 2005 as the single body responsible for meeting Ireland's health and social care needs. The HSE provides thousands of services to young and old, in hospitals, health facilities and in communities across the country. The largest employer in the State, the HSE employs more than 65,000 staff in direct employment and a further 35,000 staff are employed by voluntary hospitals and bodies funded by the HSE.
As the primary vendor leading a consortium of third party partners, McKesson participates on the HSE NIMIS Governance board, a team responsible for executive decisions that ensure a successful project deployment. With McKesson in this role, NIMIS benefits from a streamlined communications process, assured responsibility and accountability. This is a distinct advantage to successful implementation.
About McKesson
McKesson UK, a subsidiary of McKesson Corporation, is the trusted healthcare technology solutions and services provider specialising in workforce, clinical and administrative information technology and medical imaging solutions and has operated in the UK since 1990.
McKesson's approach to the UK healthcare market is fundamentally different because it is based on years of selling, operating, and supporting healthcare systems to healthcare professionals now installed in virtually every NHS organisation. McKesson's unique consultative approach ensures that both clinicians and management are fully engaged with any new system and its outcomes before any sale is made, or implementation starts. This guarantees the successful uptake and onward operation of McKesson's systems ensuring that its patient-centric technologies are based on successful outcomes through the active engagement with healthcare professionals at every stage.
McKesson's dedicated 800+ strong workforce, which since May 2011 now includes System C, Healthcare, delivers to virtually every NHS organisation as well as to a number of other public and private sector organisations. As operators of the world's largest integrated HR and payroll system - the NHS Electronic Staff Record (ESR) - McKesson pays 7% of the working population in England and Wales, a workforce of more than 1.4 million NHS employees.