Located in rural West Virginia, Davis Health Systems is a forward-thinking organization that employs 16 radiologists and 11 cardiologists.  The organization offers services unique to its area, including cardiology imaging and digital mammography.
 “A lot of rural communities don’t offer digital mammography,” explains Debra Thorpe, radiology manager at Davis Health System, “But we wanted a Picture Archiving and Communication System (PACS) that could do that and so much more.”
In order to continue to offer the medical imaging services that would ensure patient needs were put first, Davis Health Systems needed to implement medical imaging solutions that were just as forward thinking as the organization.  They found these solutions by working with McKesson.

Within-in three-and-a-half months, McKesson and Davis Health System worked to convert its most critical imaging studies so that physicians had that information most readily available. In all, nearly 500,000 images were migrated to the new system to become a part of the patient’s medical record.

Using McKesson, staff physicians at Davis Health Systems can now access patient reports and images at the same time, from anywhere. Patients benefit because their images travel electronically wherever they go in the system, eliminating the need to repeat the study and improving the physician’s ability to quickly and accurately diagnose and treat the patient.

“Typically, organizations, especially small ones, are hesitant to undertake a PACS conversion,” says Nina Virone, chief information officer of Davis Health System. “But when you partner with a vendor like McKesson, you can feel confident that the transition to the best and latest technology will be smooth and painless. Our outcomes are even better than we expected.”

The streamlined workflow has enabled radiologists and cardiologists at Davis Health System to reduce report turnaround time to referring physicians from 24 hours to a mere hour or two. In fact, most reports are completed, read and electronically signed off within 30 minutes.

“McKesson has put an enterprise wide imaging and information management solution in place not only for today but for the future,” adds Virone. “Just like any health system, business needs of our organization will change, but now our imaging IT solution positions us to meet those needs.”

Learn more by reading the complete version of this case study, originally published by McKesson.