Looking back on a successful ECR

Find out about the trends discovered at ECR earlier this year? ECR 2016 was successful! We clearly sensed the need for radiation protection and quality improvement in radiology in light of the implementation of the European Council Directive 2013/59/EURATOM. Many people visited us on the booths of our resellers to watch demonstrations of our DOSE solution. It enables hospitals to register, analyse and optimize dose, and improve workflow and procedures. Find out about the trends related to dose monitoring and clinical evaluations as well as lectures and imaging maturity models.

Left: Visit of Dr. Keith Dryer (Harvard), who responded positively to the DOSE demo. Right: Evguénia Boldyréva, Qaelum Application Specialist interacting with customers and prospects on the FUJIFILM booth.

DOSE on display at resellers

At ECR, we saw that our resellers AGFA and FUJIFILM successfully respond to the market need for dose monitoring solutions. Both resellers contribute to dose reduction through optimising dose detectors (FUJIFILM) and image processing (AGFA). Dose monitoring was a key trend at ECR, across the exhibition and in the scientific lectures, creating awareness among the different stakeholders. Our DOSE solution was a highlight on both partners' booths.

Dose monitoring & clinical audits

The European Society of Radiology (ESR) focusses on increasing quality standards in radiology departments. It stresses the importance of dose monitoring as well as performing clinical audits. This year the society has announced its ESR basic patient safety standards. The document provides guidance in assessing the current situation of your radiology department compared to a list of key areas.

The methodology for executing clinical audits, as suggested by ESR, is in line with Qaelum’s clinical baseline evaluations performed in many radiology departments. The basic safety standards are implemented in the automated BASELINE solution of Qaelum, allowing departments to evaluate the current status of their processes compared to the best practices.

The EuroSafe session confirmed the trend of radiology departments` evaluation and ranking based on availability of key aspects within the department, such as dose monitoring and clinical audits programme. EuroSafe released its Imaging Stars, which reveal the imaging facilities across Europe that execute best practices in radiation protection. Radiology departments cannot score three stars (out of five) – unless they have a dose monitoring solution in place and carry out clinical audits periodically.

Well-attended Qaelum lectures

Left: Jan Schillebeeckx, CMO Qaelum. Right: Niki Fitousi, Qaelum’s Sr. Medical Physicist

AuntMinnieEurope reported on the lecture of Jan Schillebeeckx, CMO Qaelum, presented at ECR. Will PACS find a new home in the cloud? The momentum is building for the adoption of cloud computing technology in healthcare in the European Union (EU). For the traditional PACS, cloud computing offers many potential benefits as well as some concerns, according to Jan Schillebeeckx.

Also Niki Fitousi, Qaelum’s Sr. Medical Physicist presented a study titled ‘Correlation of peak skin dose with geometrical and dosimetric parameters from interventional procedures’. Initially submitted as a scientific poster, the study was evaluated with a high score and was selected to be presented orally in the Voice of Epos, as part of the ‘Interventional Radiology’ session. Registered ECR users can watch the presentation video here.

Imaging maturity models

HIMSS analytics in Europe, in partnership with the ESR, introduced at the 2016 ECR congress a digital imaging adoption model (DIAM). The new model offers guidelines for institutions to benchmark their progress with regard to implementing a healthcare imaging IT strategy. Several levels of the model refer to dose monitoring, clinical audit and clinical decision support solution. Read more