Emageon’s Enterprise Medical Imaging Software Meets IHE Year 4 Framework In Time for RSNA 2002

BIRMINGHAM, AL - (November 13, 2002) - Emageon, a leading provider of enterprise solutions for medical imaging, announced successful integration tests at the 2002 IHE (Integrating the Healthcare Enterprise) Connect-a-Thon. Meeting the IHE Year 4 technical framework fulfills its goal of accomplishing this feat in time for the 88th Scientific Assembly and Annual Meeting of the Radiological Society of North America in Chicago, December 1-6, 2002. Emageon participates in the IHE Initiative as a vendor and also serves on the IHE Planning and Technical Committees.

“At the IHE Year 4 Connect-a-Thon, we verified that the latest release of the Emageon Enterprise Archive Manager was able to integrate with numerous other products in the manner prescribed by the IHE Technical Framework,” said Chris Magyar, Emageon’s Vice President of Engineering. “More specifically, as an Image Manager and Image Archive Actor, our product satisfies the requirements for the Scheduled Workflow, Patient Information Reconciliation, Consistent Presentation of Images, Key Image Note and Access to Radiology Information Integration Profiles. As a Report Repository and External Report Repository Access actor, our product satisfies the requirements for the Simple Image and Numeric Reports and Access to Radiology Information Integration Profiles. Our support for this set of Actors and Integration Profiles allows us to provide our customers with a medical imaging infrastructure that makes IHE-based integrated solutions a reality. Unlike much of the beta software that is seen at many IHE demonstrations, our IHE Year 4 software is commercially available and ready to go – today.”

“IHE enables faster, more efficient, less expensive and more successful integration,” said Jeff Sulzner, Director of Information Services Consulting for Sisters of Mercy, an Emageon customer. “As IHE defines it, standards-based integration solutions are also more flexible, longer-lived and easier and less expensive to maintain than proprietary methods. At Sisters of Mercy, we have committed to an IHE framework in order to attain the inherent benefits of an open-systems approach while avoiding the pitfalls associated with closed and proprietary systems. Vendors committed to a future IHE framework must store all relevant images, presentation states, key object notes and reports back to the study in public DICOM tags to ensure that the sanctity of the study’s contents is preserved over the life of the study.”

“The IHE initiative is a critical element of Emageon’s overall strategic plan,” said Milton Silva-Craig, Emageon’s Chief Operating Officer. “It brings together the users and developers of healthcare information and imaging systems to advance data integration by removing the barriers to optimal patient care through open-systems solutions. When critical patient information is stored and processed in a proprietary manner, it cannot be passed seamlessly from system to system – within and across departments – and made available as needed at the point of care. Open systems mean sharing of information beyond the radiology suite, allowing all referring physicians better access to images, related image information and reports. This allows faster and more efficient care, leading to better treatment outcomes, and more satisfied patients.”

For more information on the IHE Year 4 Technical Framework go to www.rsna.org/IHE or send an email to ihe@rsna.org or ihe@himss.org.

About Emageon
Emageon enables IDNs (integrated delivery networks), hospitals, healthcare systems and imaging facilities to have an enterprise-wide, fully-open, multi-”ology,” multi-modality, digital imaging environment – featuring immediate cost savings, extreme scalability and performance, no risk of obsolescence and minimal capital outlay. With essentially limitless scalability, our solution can manage any size facility and complexity – even extremely large, multi-site, multi-specialty medical image repositories which may be centralized or distributed. Emageon’s high-performance software and vendor-neutral, open-systems approach lowers total cost of ownership and eliminates technical obstacles that prevent a healthcare enterprise from converting to a fully digital environment.

Emageon’s cost-effective, managed-use business model also eliminates financial obstacles to digital transformation and has two solution configurations. The first includes our enterprise medical image storage and distribution management software bundled with storage management hardware. The second adds our enterprise storage infrastructure’s seamless integration of all necessary open-systems display and workflow software and hardware, and all necessary services for rapid implementation, process optimization and adoption success management. This total solution enhances diagnostic capability, patient care delivery and workflow efficiency of all specialty physicians and supporting professional staff as well as improved financial performance for the healthcare enterprise. For additional information on Emageon, visit www.emageon.com.


Contact:
Noel Gartman
Emageon
205-980-7602
ngartman@emageon.com

David Latham
Delta Capital Management LLC
901-755-0949
yearwood@deltacapital.com