More bad news for PNCL - they were hoping to penetrate this market.
10:03 am Eastern Time
Company Press Release
StorageTek Provides Foundation for the Filmless Hospital
Offers Scalable, Cost-Effective Medical Imaging Archive Solution
Industry-First Medical Archive Solution Improves Patient Care, Manages Escalating Costs of
Storing Electronic Radiology Images
CHICAGO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Dec. 1, 1997--Storage Technology Corp., (StorageTek[R]),
the preeminent provider of network computing storage, today announced the industry's first reliable,
secure, high-performance and high capacity medical archive system.
With the support of StorageTek's healthcare and integration partners, the new archive solution grants
hospital personnel immediate access to critical patient information data, helping to improve patient
care and diagnosis; reducing electronic image archiving costs and improving hospital efficiency.
Until now, hospitals had few options; storing radiology images on film is costly and films have to be
manually transported to different locations, often getting lost or damaged in the process. As hospitals
such as the University of Utah and the Cleveland Clinic discovered, storing medical image x-rays on
low-capacity optical disks is expensive and inconvenient due to the large number of optical disks
and limited capacities of optical jukeboxes. Now, StorageTek's medical archiving solution enables
hospitals to quickly and cost-effectively automate the retrieval of medical images and records.
When StorageTek's Medical Imaging Archive solution is coupled with a Picture Archive and
Communication System (PACS), StorageTek offers physicians' a completely filmless solution that
frees them up to better attend to patient needs. This integrated archive solution can be dedicated to
radiology and can also easily be shared with cardiology and other applications within the hospital
such as electronic medical records and hospital information systems.
At the Cleveland Clinic, one of the top ten hospitals in the United States according to U.S. News
and World Report, being able to quickly and efficiently access patient records is critical, said Dr.
Robert Cecil, network director, department of radiology. ''We are replacing a large cache of
off-line optical media and duplicates of film copy with StorageTek's medical imaging archive. This
solution has allowed our physician's to access records in under 60 seconds, as opposed to hours
and even days it took with film. The deployment of StorageTek's archive has increased the efficiency
of our physicians and has resulted in improved quality care for our patients.''
The StorageTek Medical Archive Solution includes:
Application Storage Management (ASM) software that provides a direct open connection
between a hospital's Picture Archive and Communications System (PACS) and the network
attached storage
An online RAID disk coupled with high-capacity Nearline(TM) automated tape, enabling
direct access to all patient's complete historical imaging records
Network security products to ensure the integrity and privacy of confidential patient
information
Worldwide on-site support and service to help keep the archive available at all times
''As paper and film storage costs continue to soar, radiology professionals understand that a
long-term archive is the foundation of a filmless plan,'' said Darrell Royal, vice president, Solutions
Business Group, Storage Technology Corp. ''Our new solution is flexible, open and high
performing, allowing hospitals to grow and reconfigure the archive as their needs change. It also
enables other hospital systems to integrate as needed with the archive and offers the fastest retrieval
times of patient files available today.''
Access to a critically injured person's X-ray within minutes, if not seconds, can be a key factor in the
diagnosis and treatment of the patient. At the same time, hospitals are charged with the difficult task
of managing the increasing costs of labor and floor space associated with traditional manual methods
of storing and retrieving information.
''The StorageTek medical archive solution will quickly eliminate the need for us to produce film
following MEG and MRI examinations,'' said Dr. William Orrison, chairman of radiology, University
of Utah. ''We will no longer have to produce a series of films, hang it on a board for interpretation,
file it in a physical jacket for up to 15 years at a cost of $50 a film. Instead, we keep all that
information in StorageTek's archive, and interpret test results on a computer at a fraction of the time
and cost.''
The StorageTek medical archive solution is available immediately, ranging from 500 GB to hundreds
of terabytes in capacity, with a variety of price and performance options.
StorageTek is the preeminent provider of network computing storage. The company's products and
services are used to store, transport and secure more than 100 petabytes of the world's information,
ranging from mainframe data to client/server applications to video, audio and still images. The
company (Storage Technology Corp., NYSE:STK), based in Louisville, Colo., reported earnings of
$180.3 million on revenue of $2.04 billion in 1996. Information on StorageTek is available on the
World Wide Web at storagetek.com.
Contact:
StorageTek, Louisville, Colo.
David Reid, 303/673-4815
david_reid@stortek.com
or
Applied Communications
Katie Ting, 650/375-8881
kting@appliedcom.com |
