AMICAS launches web-based diagnostic imaging platform

New Products and Partnerships Highlighted at Symposium for Computer Applications in Radiology

To support growing demand for affordable, digital, secure and immediate access to diagnostic images, AMICAS, Inc. recently introduced a comprehensive platform that renders traditional and proprietary Picture Archiving and Communications Systems (PACS) obsolete and sets a new course for the diagnostic imaging industry.

The company's amicas.net(sm) platform includes a new personal viewer, a new diagnostic workstation, a comprehensive service monitor, and integration with voice recognition, reports and electronic medical records. amicas.net(sm) was showcased today at the 18th Annual Symposium for Computer Applications in Radiology (SCAR). It debuted simultaneously at the Medical Users Software Exchange (MUSE) in Anaheim, Calif.

In addition, the company announced several new strategic partnerships and agreements that underscore AMICAS' influence in the digital imaging industry and illustrate its reliability as a developer of digital imaging technology.

"With more than 400 million annual radiology exams performed in the U.S. alone, diagnostic images set the course for medical detection and treatment," said Hamid Tabatabaie, president and CEO of AMICAS. "Timely and practical access to images and the corresponding reports has been the Achilles heel of the diagnostic imaging industry.

With a wide-ranging suite of managed applications, our technology platform has solved the problem. We have moved the industry beyond PACS. Whether it's a single radiologist or a network of 4,000 physicians, our users can now securely and conveniently access images and reports to deliver the best care to their patients."

In commenting on the new product announcements from AMICAS, John Quinn, principal within the Health/Managed Care Practice at Cap Gemini Ernst & Young U.S. LLC (CGE&Y), noted that AMICAS has raised the bar in the diagnostic image management industry. "A long list of vendors has been providing imaging solutions for over a decade. The significance of the AMICAS announcement is in the fact that one vendor, utilizing standards-based technology components, is delivering the full scope of functionality at the most affordable price points." AMICAS is working toward establishing CGE&Y as its preferred systems integrator for implementing amicas.netsm services for its customers.

"Digital radiology is no longer about individual products strung together piecemeal," said Dr. Matthew Barish, vice chairman of the Boston Medical Center radiology department. "The AMICAS platform is significantly more functional than traditional PACS and much more cost effective."

Industry-Changing Platform
"Last year alone, AMICAS handled more than 60 million images," said Tabatabaie. "We continue to evolve the process and incorporate the feedback in our product development."

The products and services debuted by AMICAS represent more than five years of development and experience with approximately 80 active installations.

AMICAS Diagnostic Workstation, developed collaboratively with eFilm, is fully Web and DICOM compatible with a JPEG 2000-compliant archive. The AMICAS diagnostic workstation demonstrates "one-click", instantaneous, and simultaneous access to prior patient images and studies. This innovative technology renders the "pre-fetching" technique, the heart of today's PACS, obsolete. The workstation also integrates with voice recognition systems for transcribing and accessing radiologists' reports.

AMICAS Viewer, the most widely used Web-viewer in the industry, now includes advanced features and seamless integration capabilities with electronic medical record (EMR) applications.

Personal AMICAS (PA) enables radiologists or other physicians to securely receive full fidelity diagnostic images via their home computers, even over slow lines.

"Personal AMICAS is the courier truck that safely delivers vital packages to the most remote neighborhoods, even those paved with slow modem lines," said Tabatabaie. "If a healthcare institution is to take full advantage of digital imaging, all users, irrespective of their digital neighborhoods, must have access."

AMICAS Watch is the company's monitoring service. The product monitors performance and quality of service and provides fundamental decision support tools for every aspect of the image management function.

"If Personal AMICAS and the AMICAS Viewer are our image courier trucks, then AMICAS Watch is our package and delivery tracking site," noted Tabatabaie. "The user of the service can see what happened to the images. Were they captured with the correct patient information? Did the images and reports travel intact from point A to point B? Who looked at the images, and did the whole transaction take longer than it should have?"

According to Ken Burgess, an industry consultant, AMICAS Watch represents an important first in the Web-based PACS/image distribution market.

The entire platform, including the AMICAS Server, the most scalable in the industry, and the AMICAS Archive, for instantaneous access to prior patient exams, is a per-exam service model. The imaging center or the hospital pays for the service when the images have been captured; there are no additional fees for unlimited viewing, archiving or 24 x 7 customer service.

"Our customers pay us when they experience a revenue event called a radiology exam," said Tabatabaie. "The manual film-based system is costing hospitals anywhere from $12 to $25 per exam. Our superior service, when fully loaded with infrastructure and professional services costs, approaches merely $6 per exam."

The amicas.net(sm) platform removes the boundaries between departmental PACS, enterprise medical records and wide-area teleradiology, achieving unmatched versatility, reliability and efficiency.

About AMICAS, Inc.
AMICAS, Inc. is a private company based in Newton, Massachusetts. Since its founding in 1995, the company has utilized the Web as a technology platform to provide diagnostic quality radiology image management services, including secure image capture, distribution, workflow integration and image archiving. For more information about AMICAS, Inc. or the amicas.net(sm) suite of services, visit www.amicas.com.

Source: AMICAS, Inc.

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