Intelerad software increases radiologists’ productivity, while its distributed architecture enables it to effectively serve patients located hundreds of miles away.
About Insight Medical Imaging
For over 70 years, Insight Medical Imaging has provided state-of-the-art medical imaging services to the city of Edmonton and its surrounding areas. Having started out as a smaller, hospital-based imaging organization, Insight has grown significantly over the past 10 years, following their move from film to IntelePACS. By leveraging Intelerad’s award-winning solution, the imaging group has been able to implement a more effective workflow.
Intelerad Helps Drive a More Agile Organization
Since their inception, Insight has provided the latest services in diagnostic radiology, placing a great deal of emphasis on patient access and prompt service to referring physicians. In 2007, as an increasing number of radiology groups moved from film to digital solutions, Insight chose to deploy Intelerad’s award-winning IntelePACS solution.
Once deployed, and with an IntelePACS-based workflow in place, Insight’s radiologists were able to greatly increase productivity and reduce turnaround times on reports. Part of these efficiency gains came from IntelePACS’ ability to transfer images across locations, which allows Insight to balance workloads across the organization, leading to greater operational efficiency. Overall, with IntelePACS in place, Insight has been able to grow their referrer base and increase their yearly study count.
“IntelePACS has had a positive impact by putting the information that radiologists need at their fingertips so they can serve patients as quickly as possible,” said Andrew Batiuk, Insight’s IT manager. “The solution has also enabled us to be more productive without increasing staff, so we can serve a greater number of patients while increasing our productivity.”
Batiuk’s thoughts are echoed by Insight’s Chief Operating Officer, Mike Balt.
“Intelerad is a key tool for Insight, and has allowed us to significantly increase our efficiency in some areas,” said Balt. “With the real-time visualization of data, we’re able to look at key performance indicators such as turnaround time, and know what it is going on day-to-day and minute-to-minute, so we can react quickly."
Rural Locations Impressed with Better Performance
Deploying IntelePACS has also helped Insight expand their reach to rural areas. An example of this would be the complete diagnostic imaging center they opened in Fort McMurray in 2012. Located 280 miles (500 km) north of Edmonton, the city is one of Canada’s hubs for oil production and features a steadily-growing population. Offering a wide range of services, the studies that are conducted in the Fort McMurray clinic are remotely read by Insight’s Edmonton based team; the images and report results are promptly available to the referring physician.
Prior to opening the Fort McMurray clinic, many Fort McMurray patients travelled several hours to an Edmonton clinic. The tremendous improvement in patient care was welcomed by patients and referring physicians in the community. IntelePACS has enabled the clinic to run essentially trouble free, with only minimal remote administration and maintenance needed in over a year of operation.
“When we opened our Fort McMurray clinic, the patients were in awe that they could call and get an appointment within days, and amazed that the exam could be read so quickly,” said Batiuk. “Results that took weeks before our clinic opened, are now available typically in hours.”
Providing referring physicians quick and easy access to images
To better serve referring physicians, Insight also deployed InteleConnect, Intelerad’s clinical hub for physicians that provides easy access to patient images and exams, anywhere and anytime. The solution has been a key differentiator for Insight, as the self-service solution provides referring physicians quick and easy access to the images and information they need.
“Referring physicians have responded well to InteleConnect,” said Batiuk. “They appreciate the speed at which they can gather information and seem to prefer getting their info online as opposed to relying on CDs.”
According to Mr. Batiuk, InteleConnect’s ease of use has been instrumental to the solution’s adoption.
“InteleConnect is simple to use and gets images to physicians in a very easy way, which is good, as they don’t need to worry about technology or be technically inclined to leverage the solution.”
Conclusion
From an organizational perspective, Insight tries to make life as easy and straightforward as possible for radiologists by implementing tools that are easy to use. By doing so, they can minimize any distractions the technology imposes on their radiologists so they can focus on image interpretation and patient care. Furthermore, they can rely on Intelerad to continually develop features that meet their needs.
“I think Intelerad is still the right choice for us,” said Batiuk. “While any PACS will have some benefits, Intelerad has been at the forefront, pushing out new features that address our concerns.”
With IntelePACS in place, Insight’s radiologists have been able to implement a flexible tool that allows them work more efficiently, and process greater workloads than they could in the past. Not only has this helped the organization steadily grow their business, but also deliver accurate reports quickly to referring physicians.
As Balt said, “With IntelePACS, we’re able to improve turnaround times, get results to referring physicians and close loops for a continuous care cycle.”
July 25, 2024 
