Broward Health in South Florida is one of the 10 largest healthcare systems in the U.S.
To accommodate a broad user community that captures and views imaging information across a network of diverse physical devices, Broward Health’s picture archiving and communication system (PACS) administration team looked for the “space station” of imaging platforms. The team selected the most flexible, modular and neutral solution on the market: Mach7 Enterprise Imaging Platform.
Broward Health
Providing service for more than 75 years, Broward Health in South Florida is one of the 10 largest healthcare systems in the U.S., and currently operates more than 50 healthcare facilities. The system includes a comprehensive radiology department that averages more than 700 studies each day. Changing clinical demands required Broward Health to take a closer look at the hospital system’s imaging strategy and make a change to support the current and future needs of their clinicians.
Changing Requirements
Central to the patient care strategy at Broward Health is the ability to collaborate simply across an ever-expanding network. Broward’s legacy PACS systems weren’t keeping pace with the organization’s strategy to build a faster and more reliable environment to support evidence-based medicine and physician collaboration. Broward needed a flexible and scalable solution that would tightly integrate with their EHR for quick access to the entire medical records system, including universal viewing of patient images.
Existing PACS Brought “Exhausting Complexity”
Broward Health’s existing PACS systems were bringing “exhausting complexity” to the hospital’s environment and did not keep pace with the organization’s strategy to build a faster and more reliable system for physician collaboration. Knowing that they still had several years left on their PACS contract, the team conducted a self-assessment to evaluate how much it would cost to continue supporting their PACS environment. They were then able to compare those costs to the strategic investment of moving to an enterprise imaging platform. The business impact of waiting until the end of their PACS contract was exponentially greater, so they decided to move forward with an enterprise imaging solution as soon as possible.
Goals for Broward Health’s Enterprise Imaging Solution
• Improve enterprise-wide, multi-specialty collaboration;
• Reduce access time and increase availability of patient imaging files, regardless of capture or storage location;
• Streamline image viewing requirements;
• Control mounting imaging storage and management costs;
• Enforce regulatory compliance for HIPAA/HITECH;
• Become PACS-agnostic to improve workflow enterprise-wide; and
• Ensure images are stored in a truly vendor-neutral archive.
The Solution
After a lengthy evaluation period of PACS and VNA-based enterprise imaging solutions, Broward Health selected Mach7 Technologies as
a vendor.
“Our collaborative partnership with Mach7 gives us a comprehensive and robust patient-centered solution that supports broad-scale clinical and business requirements,” said Broward Health IT Manager James Orr. “The VNA component of the platform helps us build the foundation we need to integrate, access and share imaging studies across our enterprise.”
Results/Ongoing Benefits
• Measured ROI and storage savings: Image storage is consolidated across the enterprise. All PACS image storage needs are centralized, regardless of modality or location of image acquisition.
“The VNA solution has been cost effective for Broward Health. We’ve done a study on the cost of storing DICOM and non-DICOM images and the value proposition is there. Mach7 Enterprise Imaging Platform gives us the ability to control and enforce compliance and HIPAA regulations, and store all the domains in one centralized location. We have better control of the data at a lower cost and high availability to leverage solutions that aren’t proprietary.”
—Ronaldo Möntmann, VP of information technology, Broward Health
• Access to a complete patient record: Centralized, consistent and rapid access to complete patient records improves collaboration and connects patients with physicians.
“VNA is a very delicate term. The system has to be truly neutral. The physician needs to see the images in their native format, with no reformatting, wrapping or adding text. Images must be stored so that if anything changes, the images are intact so they can be returned to the imaging device for review if needed. This is a critical component of the Mach7 solution.”
—Boris Kalitenko, senior PACS administrator, Broward Health
• Positive impacts on clinician and patient well-being are recognized: Broward Health is also able to integrate best-of-breed viewers with the Mach7 platform, allowing clinicians to use their viewer of choice and the one that best suits the clinical needs of the patient.
“Considering viewers and how you access patient images is critical. Not only can the right system enhance your ability to provide the highest level of care at minimal cost, but it can also augment how you impact patient well-being and quality of life.”
—Boris Kalitenko, senior PACS administrator, Broward Health
• Real-time visibility into the imaging system’s health and synergy with the Mach7 support team: Broward Health and the Mach7 support team have the same visibility into the imaging system’s health, ensuring seamless communication and problem solving.
“There is an unsurpassed level of trust and engagement with the Mach7 support team. We have a dashboard that gives a real-time view of the health of our system. The support team has the same view and if there is ever a hiccup, the Mach7 team takes care of it right away.”
—Boris Kalitenko, senior PACS administrator, Broward Health
“We needed an enterprise imaging system built like the space station; modular and without incurring expense when you try to lift it up,” said Kalitenko. “It needed components that were interchangeable, flexible and scalable. With Mach7, we not only have a system with true vendor neutrality, but we also have a great partnership as well.”
Case study supplied by Mach7 Technologies.
July 25, 2024 
