Philips, Hitachi collaborate to offer next-gen VNA by second half of 2016
Philips and Hitachi are putting their heads together to offer a vendor neutral archive (VNA) system that, they say, overcomes the performance and scalability issues that other VNA products have struggled to solve, especially in larger health systems.
In a joint announcement sent out Feb. 18, Amsterdam-based Royal Philips and Santa Clara, Calif.-based Hitachi Data Systems (a subsidiary of Hitachi Ltd. of Tokyo), the companies say their new solution can deliver all manner of medical images to just about anywhere within a given health system in less than three seconds.
They add that the VNA collaboration combines Philips’s expertise in enterprise medical image management solutions with Hitachi’s digital health data management capabilities.
Specifically, the product builds off Philips’s HealthSuite digital platform to optimize “standards-based interoperability, scalability and high-speed performance” so as to “help reduce costs and avoid repeat exams,” according to the announcement.
William A. Burns, vice president of health and life sciences at Hitachi Data Systems, says the two companies are “committed to addressing the need for integrated and homogeneous universal clinical data management and orchestration to give clinicians the access and data insights” they need if they are to achieve the goal of better outcomes and higher care quality.
Philips plans to launch the solution in the second half of this year and will showcase it at HIMSS 2016, booth #3416, in Las Vegas from Feb. 29 through March 4.
Dave P. has worked in journalism, marketing and public relations for more than 30 years, frequently concentrating on hospitals, healthcare technology and Catholic communications. He has also specialized in fundraising communications, ghostwriting for CEOs of local, national and global charities, nonprofits and foundations.