Editorial
Managing Patient Communication
Dear Readers, The focus of this edition is on patient management topics in medical imaging: we cover the ins and outs of informed consent in interventional radiology, the decreasing visibility of radiologists to their patients and referring clinicians and the issues surrounding this, as well as ways to reduce patient anxiety and the role of nurses in improving and facilitating communication. Patient ques...
MIR Review
13th Annual Management in Medical Imaging (MIR) Scientific Meeting
The 13th Annual Scientific Meeting of Management in Radiology (MIR), a professional meeting bringing together chairmen, managers and business administrators of medical imaging departments worldwide, took place in Palma, Mallorca from 14 – 15 October, 2010. The official business and management assembly for leaders in diagnostic imaging, the MIR meeting once again drew an impressive line-up of top speak...
Association News
CIRSE Unveils Global International Radiology Statements
42 national and international societies from around the world united to support the "Interventional Radiology (IR) Global Statement", which highlights the importance of IR in modern medical care and outlines the identity and scope of IR practice worldwide. The Society of Interventional Radiology (SIR), the Cardiovascular and Interventional Radiological Society of Europe (CIRSE) and 40 other national and in...
ECRI Institute 17th Annual Web Conference
ECRI Institute® has named Kaiser Permanente, a healthcare provider and not-forprofit health plan, as the winner of the 5th annual health devices achievement award for excellence in health technology management. The award recognises an outstanding initiative under taken by an ECRI Institute member healthcare institution that improves patient safety, reduces costs, or otherwise facilitates better strategic...
CARS Congress 2011: Abstract Deadline Approaching
The joint Annual Scientific Meetings of the ISCAS, EuroPACS, CAR, CAD and CMI societies are scheduled to take place during 2011 in Berlin from June 22 – 25. Please note for all those interested, that the deadline for paper and abstract submissions for the congress is January 10, 2011. The CARS Congress Organising Committee invites you to join them in Berlin in June 2011, if you work in the fields of ra...
IHE Participates in EU-Level Programmes
The European Commission has made substantial progress driving greater consistency between countries through a number of European- level initiatives and has won support for programmes covering multiple areas of interoperability. A policy recommendation on interoperability for electronic health records combined with a proposed Directive on patients' rights in cross-border healthcare has advanced to the Europ...
Corporate News
Philips
Royal Philips Electronics and Electron, a Russian medical equipment manufacturer, announced that they have completed Russia's first installation and clinical validation of a domestically made Computed Tomography (CT) scanner at the Hospital of War Veterans in St. Petersburg. The two companies have received clearance by the appropriate authorities to market the scanner, which has been designed specifically...
Hologic
This year at RSNA, Hologic invite attendees to take a closer look at their latest digital mammography including Selenia® Dimensions ®, a platform that can be configured for 3D breast imaging – pending approval by the FDA. you are invited to stop by to learn more about Hologic's solutions for breast MR and Aegis™ image analysis technology as well as the latest advances in body composition analysis, os...
Carestream
Brest Regional University Hospital in Western Brittany, France, has purchased a CARESTREAM DRX-Evolution following a study into existing equipment at the hospital and an analysis of future needs for their 24-hour emergency facility. Following installation of the DRX-Evolution, the number of examinations is said to have risen from 1,500 per month to more than 2,000. The client states that the technology of...
Simens
Royal Preston Hospital has installed two ACUSON S2000™ diagnostic ultrasound systems from Siemens Healthcare for obstetric ultrasound. The new equipment delivers superb image quality allowing the ultrasound team to conduct more detailed patient scans for better interpretation and diagnosis. The ACUSON S2000 is an easy-to-use solution, which produces high quality images, with the additional functionality...
European News
Cross-Border Reimbursement
Pan-European legislation clarifying the conditions under which patients may be reimbursed for healthcare they receive in another EU country has moved a significant step closer to its final adoption. In mid-September, EU governments formally set out their proposals that are designed to strike a balance between an individual's right to cross-border healthcare and the ability of national authorities to organi...
The Monitoring National E-Health Strategies Study
"Europe is leading the rest of the world in advancing towards modern e-health infrastructures and implementations" was the conclusion of Dr. Karl Stroetmann of empirica Consultants at an e-health Strategies Symposium in Brussels. This is a field where Europe has achieved and even overachieved its Lisbon Strategy goals. Results of the Monitoring National e-health Strategies study (www.ehealth-strategies.eu...
Cover Story
Informed Consent for Interventional Radiology Procedures
As interventional radiology develops as a specialty, the issue of informed consent is becoming more important and in many cases more complex. The doctrine of informed consent relates to the right of every competent adult to decide what will happen to his or her body, and to protect one's bodily integrity from unauthorised intrusions. This encompasses every action by a physician ranging from a simple physic...
The Radiological Identity Crisis
Some worrying conclusions can be drawn from the research of Prof. Lorenzo Derchi and his team at the department of radiology in Genoa, Italy, concerning the relationship between radiologists and patients. Paramount to this is their ongoing work exploring not only what patients think of the radiologist, but whether they even recognise which of the medical team they meet with during their exam, is the actual...
Managing Distress, Discomfort, and Anxiety in Imaging
It was once thought that physicians become radiologists because they didn't want to interact with their patients. In the joke "How do you hide a 100 dollar bill from a doctor?" the answer pertaining to the radiologist is "You pin it on the patient." But times have changed. Today, radiologists are at the critical interface between diagnosis and treatment, a time when patients and referring clinicians have q...
Managing Clinical Communication for Patient Safety:
The clinical handover process is an integral component of patient care. communication between clinicians regarding a patient's condition, treatment plan and care is directly related to the quality of health outcomes and systems success. Poor communication has been implicated as the leading cause of medication errors, delays in treatment, perinatal deaths and injuries, patient falls and wrong site surgeries...
Nuclear Medicine
The Role of 18F-FDG PET CT in Monitoring Tumour Response
Early evaluation of tumour response to chemotherapy is crucial for optimal management of oncology patients, especially given the lack of suitable response evaluation criteria to new molecular-targeted anticancer therapies. 18F-FDG PET-CT offers an added value for assessing aggregate (dimensional and metabolic) tumour response after completion of treatment in various cancer types. This methodology is being...
Management Matters
How to Conduct Staff Appraisals
A staff appraisal is a periodical advisory and support discussion between staff members and management that fosters agreements about objectives and the achievement of targets, that can be incorporated into target agreements. A staff appraisal provides the opportunity, in a systematic and structured way that is outside of every-day working routine, to discuss matters that support and advance target-oriented...
Interview
E-Health in the Netherlands
The primary aim of the Dutch government's IT policy for the healthcare sector is to improve affordability, access and quality by setting a foundation for an optimum and safe usage of ICT. The introduction of the Electronic Health Record (EHR) with corresponding infrastructure was founded as a springboard for other ICT applications in, including teleradiology and telemedicine. An IT & Innovation Steeri...
The Netherlands
According to the annual Euro Health Consumer Index, the Netherlands has the best healthcare system in Europe. It topped the European survey for the second year running scoring highly in waiting times for patients, e-health and access to medication. Many also believe that system in the Netherlands is a good model for healthcare in the U.S. This article provides a brief overview of the system supposedly the...
Sustaining the Future of Nuclear Medicine
The Netherlands continues to be at the centre of debate regarding the continued supply of medical isotopes worldwide. Molybdenum-99, the parent generator of technetium- 99m, is a crucial tool used by nuclear medicine departments to pinpoint cancer. The substance is regularly in short supply because only five large commercial producers exist worldwide, mainly via older reactors nearing the end of their life...