New words are consistently spun out in the USA and frequently assimilated into ‘American English’. Take the term ‘hospitalist’ (little used in European English), which was coined by the renowned academic physician Robert M Wachter (University of California, San Francisco) and his colleague Lee Goldman, in an article published in the New England Journal of Medicine in 1996. Lisa Chamoff…
Half of cancers can be avoided if institutions would exchange knowledge, according to Joxel García, executive director of the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, who opened the Center’s meeting in Madrid in October 2016. Technology has progressed enormously and there has never been that much knowledge of cancer to prevent it and find treatment tools.
A motorised PRS 500 B X-ray system, added to the portfolio of Protec, specialist in traditional analogue X-ray film processing machines, ‘combines efficiency, high work precision and optimum operating comfort,’ the manufacturer reports. ‘In addition to the user-friendly touch display, it also offers an automatic retraction of the tubular column, which adapts to the position of the bucky in…
Carestream Health makes converting to DR easy and affordable with the launch of its Carestream DRX-Transportable System/Lite. The system equips facilities to convert room-based or mobile imaging systems to digital radiology through use of a wireless tablet PC that gives users complete control of the X-ray system and displays diagnostic images as they are acquired.
Among the earliest centres to embrace the concept of digital pathology, the Leeds Digital Pathology Project began in 2003 thanks to a Department of Health grant. Today the centre is Europe’s largest.
Digital pathology has been the next big thing for about a decade. Yet, today only a few pathology laboratories are fully equipped to digitise their workflow, mainly for legal or financial reasons.
Beckman Coulter Diagnostics introduces a new integrated system of technologies and capabilities called DxONE, designed to ease data access and usability. DxONE was created in response to the increasing challenges faced by laboratory technicians to expedite result times, reduce costs, maneuver personnel shortages and navigate network consolidations.
In a small study of opioid prescriptions filled at a Johns Hopkins Medicine outpatient pharmacy, researchers found that handwritten orders for the drugs contribute heavily to a trio of prescribing and processing errors in contrast to those created electronically.
Konica Minolta, leading company in the medical imaging market, introduces its Premium Portable Ultrasound solution, Sonimage HS1.
In today’s digitised world, hospitals are already embracing the benefits which technology brings to improve efficiency and reduce costs. Against a backdrop of stretched resources and operational scrutiny hospital managers are able to address the needs of multiple stakeholders through hospital-wide digitalisation.
The hybrid operating room is one of the most innovative developments in the surgical sector. The combination of interventional and minimally invasive surgical procedures is exciting for many clinical disciplines. The room design, intraoperative imaging techniques as well as interdisciplinary collaboration play a pivotal role in this.
The MALDI Tissuetyper is a system that records spatially resolved mass spectra directly from tissue. This allows the direct measurement of proteins, lipids and other molecular classes without the need for antibodies or molecular probes. This results in highly multiplexed datasets in which hundreds or thousands of compounds are measured simultaneously.
Cost constraints, higher workloads, and a shortage of qualified staff are three distinct market trends driving demand for greater efficiency in the laboratory. The goals of automation are to make workflow more efficient, improve the turnaround time and predictability, and reduce errors - all while accommodating future growth. Automation also frees up staff for other activities. Report: Franz Walt
Laboratories are an essential part of effective modern healthcare. They provide clinicians with vital information that helps them make life-saving decisions, diagnose conditions and monitor patient treatment.
A fully automated clinical microbiology laboratory system went into service at Heidelberg University Hospital this April. Produced by medical technology firm BD Life Science, this first installation at a German university hospital will play a major role in a study exploring the potential benefits of lab automation in containing the spread of pathogens in a hospital.
The massive earthquake in Nepal in April 2015 killed more than 9,000 people and injured more than 23,000. Within days, medical teams from other countries had offered services to the disaster relief effort.
The Royal Sussex County Hospital, in Brighton, has installed a Siemens Healthcare Magnetom Aera 1.5-Tesla system incorporating special features to help relax younger patients. Within months of the installation of the wide bore machine, which has comfort enhancing features, there has been a significant fall in the number of patients aged 4-17 requiring general anaesthetic ahead of undergoing an…
New, screen-printed, flexible MRI coils may be able to reduce the amount of time it takes to get an MRI scan. Researchers funded by the National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering (NIBIB), part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), have developed light and flexible MRI coils that produce high quality MRI images and in the future could lead to shorter MRI scan time periods.
‘Humber River Hospital, Toronto, Canada, could come straight out of a science fiction series that provides Star Trek-like healthcare services with hall-cruising robots delivering food, medications and supplies to staff, electrochromic windows, video conference capabilities at patients’ bedsides and real-time location systems, to name but a few futuristic features. Yet, this is now and for…
A UK-based neuropathologist has highlighted how the digitisation of pathology will play a pivotal role in taking patient care on to a new and more efficient level. Speaking in a recent Webinar under the heading The Adoption and Benefits of Digital Pathology for Primary Diagnosis, Dr Daniel du Plessis also noted how the digital era would raise the profile of pathology and ‘bring it out of the…
Healthcare is going digital. No doubt about it, Prof. Hufnagl predicts. Information and communication technologies have gone beyond moving data from one place to the other; they are triggering stellar improvements in healthcare: diagnoses are becoming ever more precise, therapies ever more personalised. The extent to which the individual clinical disciplines have progressed in their technological…
Pathologists in Utrecht step away from the microscope as the first fully digital workflow goes live for primary diagnostics. ‘The whole world wants to stop by and see the show,’ said Paul van Diest MD, who leads the Department of Pathology at the Utrecht University Medical Centre.
As laboratories in Europe shift to systems for digital pathology, they must ensure the technology not only works, but works for them, says Dr Liron Pantanowitz, director of pathology informatics at University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (UPMC).
In spectral imaging, x-ray images are formed in the customary grey scale imaging procedure. However different photon energies are used, generating images in different colors. Aside from the acquisition of anatomical information, this measurement makes it possible to show different tissue compositions.
Fujifilm Sonosite announced CE mark and 510(k) clearance for its new mountable ultrasound system, the SonoSite SII. Developed for regional anesthesia, vascular access and trauma applications, the SII empowers efficiency for clinicians through a simple, yet smart user interface that adapts to the user’s imaging needs. The system is portable and can be used across multiple hospital environments,…
