The Andalusian Public Health System's New Regional Enterprise Imaging Platform has so far Saved a Million and a Half Euros

CarestreamCarestream recently held a meeting attended by representatives of the public health system of Andalusia, medical specialists and representatives of several autonomous Spanish communities. At the meeting, they shared the results of the new regional digital medical imaging system, the implementation of which was completed at the end of 2015, after 15 months of work.

According to the data provided, the public health system of Andalusia has saved €1,580,000 during the first 15 months of the project’s implementation and it is anticipated that in the coming years an annual saving of 65% will be achieved, compared with the costs of managing and maintaining medical images before the introduction of this system. Given these levels of savings, it is calculated that the investment of €6.7 million will pay for itself in only a little over two years (12.25).

The new system, based on the bilateral cooperation agreement between the Andalusian Health Service (SAS) and Red.es, within the Development of the Digital Public Health System in Andalusia and developed by the UTE (a joint venture between Carestream and Accenture), has allowed the digitisation and storage of more than 30 million radiology and nuclear medicine tests. Access to these is available to 16,000 physicians from the 80 public hospitals in Andalusia and 1,600 health centres throughout the Community. The system also allows those tests performed in subsidised private medical centres to be included.

"This project is a benchmark for other communities, both Spanish and European, since Andalusia is one of the largest regions in Europe, both in extent and number of citizens attending the SAS," stated Santos López, Director of Healthcare IT Business Development, Carestream Iberia.

In Andalusia nearly 10 million radiology and nuclear medicine diagnostic imaging tests are carried out each year. In addition to the savings and advantages for health professionals, the system brings significant benefits to more than 8.5 million Andalusians, as it ensures the same level of medical care can be provided to all citizens, regardless of where they live, and can help avoid the need to repeat tests.

For their part, physicians can access images in less time and from anywhere, analyse the results alongside the clinical history of the patients and consult doctors from other hospitals or health centres.

Investment and other project data
Investment in the project amounted to more than €6.7 million and was based on the previous agreement between the Ministry of Industry, Energy and Tourism, through the public corporation, Red.es, with Andalusian Health Service in order to fulfill the objectives of the Digital Agenda for Spain, within the Digital Public Services Plan and the Health and Welfare Programme. Red.es has financed 80% through the Regional European Development Fund (ERDF) and the SAS the other 20%.

The necessary equipment and systems have been installed in two data centres, each with 1.4 petabytes of storage capacity, equivalent to 11,000 250GB personal computers. The number of radiology and nuclear medicine teams providing medical examinations amounts to 1,345.

Related news articles:

About Carestream Health
Carestream is a worldwide provider of dental and medical imaging systems and IT solutions; X-ray imaging systems for non-destructive testing; and advanced materials for the precision films and electronics markets - all backed by a global service and support network.

CARESTREAM is a trademark of Carestream Health.

Most Popular Now

Personalized Breast Cancer Prevention No…

A new telemedicine service for personalised breast cancer prevention has launched at preventcancer.co.uk. It allows women aged 30 to 75 across the UK to understand their risk of developing breast...

New App may Help Caregivers of People Ge…

A new study by investigators from Mass General Brigham showed that a new app they created can help improve the quality of life for caregivers of patients undergoing bone marrow...

An App to Detect Heart Attacks and Strok…

A potentially lifesaving new smartphone app can help people determine if they are suffering heart attacks or strokes and should seek medical attention, a clinical study suggests. The ECHAS app (Emergency...

A Machine Learning Tool for Diagnosing, …

Scientists aiming to advance cancer diagnostics have developed a machine learning tool that is able to identify metabolism-related molecular profile differences between patients with colorectal cancer and healthy people. The analysis...

Philips Foundation 2024 Annual Report: E…

Marking its tenth anniversary, Philips Foundation released its 2024 Annual Report, highlighting a year in which the Philips Foundation helped provide access to quality healthcare for 46.5 million people around...

Scientists Argue for More FDA Oversight …

An agile, transparent, and ethics-driven oversight system is needed for the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to balance innovation with patient safety when it comes to artificial intelligence-driven medical...

New AI Transforms Radiology with Speed, …

A first-of-its-kind generative AI system, developed in-house at Northwestern Medicine, is revolutionizing radiology - boosting productivity, identifying life-threatening conditions in milliseconds and offering a breakthrough solution to the global radiologist...

New Research Finds Specific Learning Str…

If data used to train artificial intelligence models for medical applications, such as hospitals across the Greater Toronto Area, differs from the real-world data, it could lead to patient harm...

Patients say "Yes..ish" to the…

As artificial intelligence (AI) continues to be integrated in healthcare, a new multinational study involving Aarhus University sheds light on how dental patients really feel about its growing role in...

Giving Doctors an AI-Powered Head Start …

Detection of melanoma and a range of other skin diseases will be faster and more accurate with a new artificial intelligence (AI) powered tool that analyses multiple imaging types simultaneously...

'AI Scientist' Suggests Combin…

An 'AI scientist', working in collaboration with human scientists, has found that combinations of cheap and safe drugs - used to treat conditions such as high cholesterol and alcohol dependence...

Brains vs. Bytes: Study Compares Diagnos…

A University of Maine study compared how well artificial intelligence (AI) models and human clinicians handled complex or sensitive medical cases. The study published in the Journal of Health Organization...