Infotech Lead America: Five hospitals and 23 facilities within the National Health Service (NHS) in Southwest England are now equipped with cloud based Radiology Information System (RIS) deployed by Accenture.
Accenture Clinical Services help clients enhance healthcare delivery to improve patient outcomes by developing and implementing digitally-enabled care strategies and systems that include Electronic Medical Records and Medical Imaging. The new platform enables clinicians to store, access and exchange patient information over secure infrastructure.
The deployment project at NHS hospitals took 10 weeks from signing up to migration of data from the old systems to the new Accenture solution.
The hospitals are now replacing their picture archiving and communications system (PACS) with RIS systems. The RIS solution will enable radiologists and clinicians to securely share and manage patient diagnostic data, radiology reports, appointments and administrative functions. The solution replaces the existing system as a part of a five-year strategy.
As the solution is cloud based, clinicians across the region can share crucial patient data and save precious time in urgent cases such as stroke or major trauma. Trusts can concentrate on providing the best healthcare to patients instead of worrying about maintaining an IT system.
A study by Accenture predicts that the demand for cloud computing in medical imaging will grow 26 percent annually through 2018. Around 73 percent of healthcare organizations are expected to shift medical imaging data into the cloud and 32 percent already use some form of cloud computing for imaging. The shift from analog to digital images is a major driver to growth in the amount of data that must be stored.
IDC says healthcare organizations are beginning to embrace advanced analytics and new data sources.“Hospitals are now increasingly dependent on IT solutions to support them day-to-day, reduce human errors, limit operational costs and stay ahead in terms of technology,” said Frost & Sullivan Research Analyst Somsainathan CK.
Recently Accenture extended its BPO services to the pharmaceutical industry with an agreement to acquire Octagon Research Solutions, a provider of clinical and regulatory information management solutions. Accenture aims to cater to its pharmaceutical clients better by achieving efficient global regulatory submissions which will enable companies to get their drugs in the research pipeline quickly to the market and at lower cost. Accenture was awarded a two-year contract with Madrid Health Authority to deliver consulting services that will enhance the agency’s existing healthcare IT systems.
Read Top 10 IT predictions for healthcare industry in 2013 HERE
