By Cris Bennett, clinical analyst with MD Buyline
During the 2017 RSNA the buzzwords in every vendor booth were value, comfort, and reliability. Vendors are striving to provide products that bring value to their customers and lower the total cost of ownership, resulting in minimal financial impact as reimbursement rates dwindle.
Vendors are also focused on patient comfort through decreasing exam times or just enhancing the overall experience of a radiology exam. Lastly, vendors are looking hard at machine reliability. Vendors have plans or are working on plans to diagnose failures before they occur, thereby minimizing downtime.
Customers are telling vendors at the show that they are looking for help with workflow management from the time patients arrive to the time they leave. Facilities need help in determining where they are lacking in their workflow through the radiology space so patients are not just sitting in a waiting room. Many vendors are looking hard at ways to provide data and to improve the overall workflow from beginning to end, to ensure that the patient has a great experience while being seen in the radiology department.
This has been a big year for new system offerings. In the CT space Siemens has new SOMATOM go.ALL, SOMATOM go.TOP SOMATOM Edge+, Hitachi has the SupriaTrue 64, GE offers the Revolution Frontier, Toshiba has the Aquilion Prime SP and Aquilion Precision(FDA Pending), and Samsung Neurologica offers the OmniTom system.
In the MRI space Siemens offers the MAGNETOM Vida 3T and the MAGNETOM Terra 7T, GE offers the SIGNA Premier 3T, Philips has the Prodiva 1.5T (FDA Pending) and Hitachi has Echelon Smart.
In the Molecular Imaging space Philips has the new CardioMD 4 and the Body MD and Siemens showed their “works in progress” (not yet FDA approved) Biograph Vision.
When speaking to vendors in the booth they have relayed that they are using their systems to aid “deep learning” in order to build up their artificial intelligence, which will help with future enhancements and help with protocol decisions and patient table placement, in order to provide the best scans with the lowest radiation dose.
About the author: Cris Bennett joined MD Buyline in 2015 with more than 19 years of experience in medical imaging. He has a diverse background in general radiography, CT, MRI and radiology IT. Before joining MD Buyline, he served in multiple positions at Dallas Regional Medical Center as lead MRI technologist and PACS administrator. These duties provided valuable experience in coordinating the radiology department’s quality assurance program. He has also worked as a dedicated pediatric MRI technologist at Children’s Hospital of Dallas, where he gained experience in pediatric MRI and DTI research. As an MRI field service engineer, Bennett helped develop new T1 Fast Spin Echo scans that had not previously been available on low-field MRI systems. At MD Buyline, he serves as the primary analyst for CT and MRI systems, and provides insight, along with other analysts, on radiology IT solutions. Bennett graduated from the Parkland School of Radiology in Dallas and completed the Medical Technology Management Institute’s MRI physics training program in Milwaukee. He holds his registry license in Radiologic Technology and Magnetic Resonance through the American Registry of Radiologic Technologists (ARRT).Back to HCB News
