GE Healthcare IT Innovates Oncology Workflow
for Centricity PACS-IW

Latest Releases Demonstrate Globalization and Enhanced Clinical Application Suites

CHICAGO, November 30, 2008 – GE Healthcare IT, a leading provider of healthcare information technology, today introduced Centricity® PACS-IW Oncology Workflow, an innovative clinical application for Web-based PET/CT functionality. Available with newly released PACS-IW version 3.7.1.1, Oncology Workflow brings advanced PET/CT capabilities to the core PACS workstation GE Healthcare IT will be demonstrating PACS-IW, Oncology Workflow, and other portfolio solutions in the GE Healthcare Booth #5529 at the 94th annual Radiological Society of North America annual meeting in Chicago.

This latest advancement for PACS-IW performs automated PET/CT image fusion, reconstruction and MIP, directly on the PACS-IW workstation, resulting in faster reading and higher clinical efficiency.  Oncology Workflow is a separately licensed, native software module that seamlessly integrates into the multi-modality reading environment of PACS-IW.  Users will appreciate the ability to leverage their investment in multi-monitor PACS workstations, review and automatically hang multi-modality historical images, and simultaneously read fused PET/CT images with the same convenience as reading an X-ray, ultrasound, nuclear medicine, MR, or CT study.

“Centricity PACS-IW Oncology Workflow has certainly transformed our busy PET/CT practice,” described Steven A. Albert, MD, senior radiologist from Manhattan’s prestigious East River Medical Imaging. “Right from our PACS-IW workstation, this fully integrated software module allows us to perform all of the activities and more as compared to a stand-alone system, resulting in improved efficiency, accuracy and presentation of findings to both the referring physician and their patients.  Powerful analytical tools, three plane anatomical, metabolic and fused color images, as well as automated rotating MIPs combined with flexible layouts for both single and comparison studies, make this an invaluable tool for any practice with PET/CT imaging.”

Oncology Workflow represents significant, new technical achievements.  An elegant implementation of the feature set includes the need to store only PET and CT axial images.  When a PET/CT study is launched from the PACS-IW viewer, as well as the viewer from a CD, all of the additional requested orthogonal views are created quickly and on-the-fly by the software’s sophisticated image reconstruction algorithms.  Consistent with other supported modalities, Oncology Workflow includes all of the capabilities of PACS-IW, such as image manipulation tools, annotations, key images, scanned documents, worklist-driven workflow, comprehensive hanging protocols, referring physician access, and shortcuts.

John Griffith, CRA and CIO of EPIC Imaging, Portland, Oregon’s largest and most technologically advanced imaging chain, explained, "The advanced PET/CT functionality brings extreme ease of data management to PACS.”  He continued, “With PACS-IW Oncology Workflow, I’ve eliminated the need to support a third-party workstation, specifically concerning data transfers to and from PACS, as well as another user interface to support and train.  In addition, Oncology Workflow now brings advanced PET/CT functionality to any networked PC over the Web, including efficient delivery via CD, two great options for our referring physicians that they didn’t have access to with our dedicated workstation. Without a doubt, this functionality brings Centricity PACS-IW closer to the perfect single workstation reading environment, eliminating the need for one more third-party workstation in the reading room and freeing the radiologist to interpret PET/CT and all of the other modalities from just about anywhere."

“As we strive to deliver the industry’s premium Web-based single desktop solution, Oncology Workflow represents a groundbreaking new module for PACS-IW,“ said Alex Natanzon, PhD, Vice President of Advanced Technologies and Applications, Dynamic Imaging Solutions, GE Healthcare IT.  “Our latest offering enables PACS-IW users to perform all their diagnostic reading on one workstation, saving capital dollars and providing tremendous workflow efficiencies for radiologists and the referring physicians they serve.”

In addition to Oncology Workflow, version 3.7.1.1 also offers enhanced features for Centricity PACS-IW Breast Imaging Workflow.  New features include global shortcuts to increase reading workflow efficiency and a “lights-off” Patient Folder user interface reducing ambient light, minimizing radiologist eye strain and overall fatigue while reading multi-modality breast imaging studies, as well as any other imaging modality on PACS-IW.

GE Healthcare IT also released PACS-IW with international character sets, now supporting French and German languages.  These new character sets include support of HL7 integration for connectivity to local HIS, RIS, and EMRs.

For more information about Centricity PACS-IW, please contact GE Healthcare IT, Dynamic Imaging Solutions at 1-888-303-PACS, or visit us online at www.dynamic-imaging.com.

About GE Healthcare
GE Healthcare provides transformational medical technologies and services that are shaping a new age of patient care. Our expertise in medical imaging and information technologies, medical diagnostics, patient monitoring systems, performance improvement, drug discovery, and biopharmaceutical manufacturing technologies is helping clinicians around the world re-imagine new ways to predict, diagnose, inform, treat and monitor disease, so patients can live their lives to the fullest.

GE Healthcare's broad range of products and services enable healthcare providers to better diagnose and treat cancer, heart disease, neurological diseases and other conditions earlier. Our vision for the future is to enable a new "early health" model of care focused on earlier diagnosis, pre-symptomatic disease detection and disease prevention. Headquartered in the United Kingdom, GE Healthcare is a $17 billion unit of General Electric Company (NYSE: GE). Worldwide, GE Healthcare employs more than 46,000 people committed to serving healthcare professionals and their patients in more than 100 countries. For more information about GE Healthcare, visit our website at  www.gehealthcare.com.