INSIDE:
Better patient experiences
Ontario’s health minister, Sylvia Jones, says the government isn’t simply looking to reduce costs when it comes to innovations. Instead, it’s seeking new ways of improving the patient experience.
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pMRI in the ICU
Kingston Health Sciences has taken delivery of a portable MRI machine that’s to be deployed in the ICU. It’s just the 9th device of its kind in Canada, and the 2nd to be implemented in an ICU.
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Smarter medical implants
Canary Medical produces intelligent implants that can be placed into the body and automatically measure how the patient is recovering from surgery. Instead of the patient telling the doctor, the implant transmits the data.
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First
of its kind communications at NYGH
Members of the team that helped put Toronto-based North York General’s communication system in the cloud include (l to r): Cynthia Esnard, Ian Purdell-Lewis, Bud Vasudeva, Dennis Young, Heather Tulk, Duska Kennedy, Garry McAllister, Joe Duncan and Sal Iuliano. The project will help the multi-site hospital modernize its communications functionality while improving system security. SEE STORY BELOW.
NYGH launches cloud-based communication system
TORONTO – In a bold move that signals a new era for healthcare communications, North York General Hospital has rolled out one of the country’s first fully integrated, cloud-based communication systems across its entire network.
Powered by TELUS and Avaya, this transformative upgrade covers six hospital sites and serves a population of over half a million, marking a pivotal moment in the modernization of healthcare infrastructure.
By shifting from on-premises telecommunication systems to a state-of-the-art cloud platform, the hospital is positioning itself as a leader in digital healthcare innovation.
Powered by TELUS and Avaya, this upgrade covers six hospital sites and a large catchment area.
This 18-month overhaul, which kicked off in early 2022, tackled a critical issue facing healthcare institutions: how to modernize communication systems without disrupting vital services.
The seamless migration, powered by TELUS and Avaya, replaced North York General Hospital’s legacy phone system with a future-ready cloud solution, ensuring the
hospital’s communications are as dynamic as the evolving healthcare landscape.
Duska Kennedy, vice president of strategy, digital health and chief digital officer at NYGH, who led the strategic rollout, emphasized that this project was about more than just upgrading technology – it was about forging partnerships to create a resilient, flexible infrastructure that supports the hospital’s growth and innovation.
“The transition to cloud technology is not just about keeping up with the times,” Kennedy explained. “It’s about ensuring we can continue to deliver exceptional care while
PHOTO: TELUS
E2P program to improve care for patients with congestive heart failure
BY ANNE-MARIE FLANAGAN
According to Heart & Stroke of Canada, an estimated 750,000 people are living with heart failure and 100,000 people are diagnosed with this disease every year. Today, heart failure is the leading cause of hospitalization for people over the age of 65.
What makes heart failure such a serious concern is that most people who are diagnosed with this chronic disease will also have other cardiovascular conditions (such as diabetes and hypertension), which complicates their treatment and affects their quality of life.
Timely diagnosis, effective medical care, and a heart-healthy diet and lifestyle all play an important role in improving a person’s recovery and overall quality of life.
For physicians and other health professionals, having access to the latest evidence is critical to delivering the best possible care to patients, and it can make a significant difference in the patient’s health outcomes.
“The challenge is that it takes months, or even years, to bring new evidence generated through research into clinical
guidelines, and then put it into practice. Because of this lengthy process, some patients may not receive the best possible care based on the latest research,” said Dr. Ilan Lenga, chief information officer at Lakeridge Health and regional chief medical information officer with the Central East Ontario Clinical Information System.
“By embedding standardized tools that reflect the latest evidence into our information system, E2P shortens this process ensuring health providers have access to the latest information to guide their treatment.”
Evidence 2 Practice (E2P) is an innovative program that uses technology to provide healthcare providers with easy, standardized access to the latest evidence to guide their decision-making.
Funded by Ontario Health, the provincial program is co-led by North York General Hospital (NYGH) for acute care hospitals, and the Centre for Effective Practice and the eHealth Centre of Excellence for primary care for physician and primary care clinics.
One of E2P’s initial projects focused on improving treatment for people diagnosed with heart failure.
Last October, seven hospital organizations became the latest participants to implement the E2P project for heart failure.
The group of hospitals (representing 14 facilities across Central Eastern Ontario) first came together in 2021 to form the Central East Hospital Cluster (CEHC) with the goal of connecting through a single, digital information system called Epic.
Following the successful adoption by North York General Hospital (NYGH) and St. Mary’s General Hospital (St. Mary’s), the CEHC was excited to collaborate with the E2P project team to implement the
project for heart failure across the 14 hospital sites.
They saw E2P as an opportunity to leverage Epic and embrace a digital solution to improve the way healthcare providers access best practice information for treating patients with heart failure.
In hospitals, physicians or nurse practitioners fill out a clinical decision support tool called an order set to prescribe specific medications, order tests, or begin other therapies to treat patients.
Every hospital has their own version of an order set, each with somewhat different best practices – and not always based on the latest research.
However, to make it easier to use across a shared system, it’s better if the partners all use a common, updated order set.
Dr. Ke Wu, a hospitalist physician and Epic physician co-lead at Peterborough Regional Hospital, was instrumental in tailoring the E2P order set for heart failure to run on Epic. He also led the work needed to adapt it to the needs of the partner hospitals.
“As a physician and Epic programmer, I was in the unique position to collaborate with hospitals from the Central East Cluster and the E2P project team to implement the E2P tool in a way reflects the way hospitalists/cardiologists work and think,” said Dr. Wu.
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“Enhancing our current order set specifically for congestive heart failure was rewarding. I am excited by the possibility that other hospitals can take this tool, adapt it and use it to guide how they treat patients,” he explained.
Physicians and other providers can now access the same order set and apply best practices in the diagnosis and treatment of heart failure.
The new order set prompts physicians to consider prescribing specific medications based on the latest evidence – such as the optimal time for medical imaging and other diagnostic and treatment options. Because of E2P’s scalability, any hospital, regardless of their location or size, can now access the same quality standards for managing heart failure patients.
Now, every patient goes home with consistent patient education guidelines to help them self-manage their chronic disease, along with a list of community resources.
“What makes E2P unique is the fact that there’s funding and project management resources attached to it, and that the project is designed to be scalable,” said Dr. Lenga.
Anne-Marie Flanagan is Manager, Corporate Communications & Public Affairs at North York General Hospital.
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Acid test for new health tech: Does it improve the patient experience?
BY JERRY ZEIDENBERG
TORONTO – Health Minister Sylvia Jones asserts that the Ontario government isn’t simply looking to reduce costs when it comes to backing innovations. Instead, it’s seeking new ways of improving the patient experience.
Of course, if cost reductions come with those innovations, that’s a welcome bonus. But improving the patient journey, overall, is the key consideration, she said.
“What are our expectations of industry?” she asked at the international Advamed medical technology conference, which was held for the first time in Canada last October. “Don’t show me the ROI, show me how it will improve patient care.”
Minister Jones was part of a panel addressing the issue of how medical innovations can reduce wait times in the healthcare system. The panel was moderated by Patrick Daly, global VP of medTech markets for IQVIA USA. It also included James Brodie, general manager of Johnson & Johnson MedTech (JJMT) in Canada, and Nicole DeKort, president and CEO of Medtech Canada, the industry association.
Jones pointed out how the COVID crisis showed healthcare providers how they could dramatically shift the way they delivered services.
For example, virtual care proved to be a lifeline for many patients during the pandemic, as hospitals and clinics were seeing, in person, only the most urgent cases.
But Jones emphasized that virtual care didn’t enhance the experience of all patients, and still doesn’t. For example, elderly and infirm patients who either don’t under-
stand computer technology or lack the dexterity to use it, do not benefit from virtual care. For them, it’s a poor experience.
“Videoconferencing is often not appropriate,” said Jones.
At the same time, she acknowledged that remote care is often a great experience for some patients. It’s all a matter of suitability.
She gave the example of a patient in Northern Ontario who came to Toronto’s University Health Network for cardiac surgery. In a test of a new technology, the patient is now using a smartwatch to monitor his post-surgery condition, with his health supervised remotely by the team in Toronto.
“That’s saving him trips to Toronto of 20 hours for follow-ups,” said Jones. “He
doesn’t have to travel. Instead, the monitoring is done through the smartwatch.”
It’s a prime example of how technology can be used to enhance the patient experience.
Jones also pointed to how technology can be used to improve the provider experience. She cited the recent trial of AI scribe technology, in partnership with the Ontario Medical Association, in which 150 family physicians have been trialing the technology.
AI scribes can monitor a patient encounter, transcribe the conversation, create a summary, and even fill out various forms and write letters for the doctor.
The pilot, in its initial phase, showed time savings of three to four hours per week for the physicians. That’s a huge ad-
vantage, as doctors worldwide have been suffering from a crushing burden of paperwork and administrative tasks.
“It’s a game changer,” said Jones. “Anecdotally, it’s looking very positive.”
IQVIA’s Daly asked the panelists to cite other examples of how medical innovations have been impacting the healthcare system and reducing waitlists.
James Brodie, of Johnson & Johnson Canada, noted that medical robots promise to advance efficiencies and reproducibility in the operating room, with the potential for a better patient experience.
Infection rates are reduced, patients spend less time in hospital and tend to recover much faster than with traditional surgeries. In the case of robot-assisted knee surgery, for example, the rehab time has been reduced from six weeks down to just three.
“Robotic assisted procedures are accelerating in Canada, particularly in the orthopedic space,” said Brodie.
He observed that further changes in medical robotics are on the horizon, with the possibility of applying more AI to the systems and connecting them across the world to collect data.
“The promise is in connecting devices to create machine learning robots,” said Brodie. This could conceivably include linking robots across the globe to proactively understand what type of procedures, implants, and post-operative protocols might be best suited for a specific patient cohort.
“Globally, from the data, you could find the best therapies and rehab practices, essentially creating a real-world evi-
SickKids is making the switch from physical pagers to smartphones
BY NORM TOLLINSKY
Toronto’s Hospital for Sick Children is one step closer to eliminating the use of physical pagers following the deployment of a cell phonebased Hypercare communication and on-call scheduling system.
Pagers are still being carried by physicians and nurses on Code Blue and Code Trauma teams, but it’s only a matter of time before they are abandoned as well, according to Dr. Karim Jessa, the hospital’s chief medical information officer.
“The goal is to completely eliminate pagers, but we first have to make sure that we have the necessary Wi-Fi and cellular coverage, because sometimes in old facilities like ours, there are dead spots in diagnostic imaging areas or in stairwells to parking lots,” he said. For all other communication needs, Hypercare is the go-to solution.
The powerful cell phone application houses the on-call schedules for more than 100 departments with contact information allowing users to message each other directly. “That’s what makes it really easy,” said Dr. Jessa, an emergency physician who does shifts in the hospital’s ER.
“You don’t have to [rely on] call locating. You don’t have to ask the ward clerk. You know who’s on-call and you can reach out right from your cell phone.”
Contact information for on-call staff was loaded into Hypercare and at SickKids’ request new fields were added, including each individual’s office location, badge number, secretary name and fax number.
SickKids started looking for a new communication solution in 2022 to replace an old system that was built inhouse using Lotus Notes. The on-call schedules were published in Lotus Notes and used by ward clerks or locating staff to page out to on-call docs. “We had been using it for 20 years and it was getting to its end of life, so we needed something different,” Dr. Jessa said.
Other vendors responding to SickKids’ RFP were able to offer an on-call scheduling system but couldn’t provide a solution that would reach out to pagers. Hypercare was able to satisfy both requirements. That was important because SickKids opted for a phased deployment that began in May 2024 with Hypercare housing the on-call schedule but still using physical pagers as the means of communication.
When phase two of the deployment
occurred in the fall, cell phones equipped with the Hypercare app took over as the means of communication, allowing the hospital to offload a large number of pagers. There are currently more than 1,000 active Hypercare accounts at the hospital.
Hypercare is also integrated with SickKids’ Everbridge emergency communication system, which still uses pagers to connect with Code Blue and Code Trauma
SickKids and Hypercare have partnered to streamline clinical communication, improve on-call scheduling, resulting in better patient outcomes.
teams. Auditing functionality built by Hypercare also provides confirmation that pages have been successfully transmitted.
Dr. Jessa cites several advantages that Hypercare offers as a means of communication in a busy hospital environment.
“With pagers, you don’t know if a page that’s coming through is about a lifethreatening issue or if it’s an order for Tylenol,” Dr. Jessa said. Using Hypercare, the sender is able to identify the importance or urgency of a message. The recipient knows if it’s a stat message or something of less importance that can be dealt with later in the day.
There is also an urgent alert function that allows users to prioritize emergency messages and even override smartphone silent and do not disturb settings. Templated messages are also accommodated.
Another important advantage is that the sender of the message knows it has been received and seen. “With pagers, you don’t know, so you end up calling again and again if there’s no response. Using Hypercare, you can also escalate a message, if necessary, to someone else who is on-call.”
Like most hospitals, SickKids has a Bring Your Own Device Policy that physicians prefer because of the convenience of carrying only one cell phone. When not on-call, they can simply turn off the messaging feature, but if they’re not on-call, they wouldn’t normally be messaged anyway.
Nurses are currently able to use the
Ontario health minister Sylvia Jones, centre, explains the government’s strategy at Advamed, in Toronto.
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Kingston Health Sciences among first to use portable MRI in the ICU
BY JERRY ZEIDENBERG
KINGSTON,
ONT.
– Kingston Health Sciences Centre (KHSC) has taken delivery of a portable MRI machine and soon plans to deploy it in its Intensive Care Unit (ICU). It’s just the ninth device of its kind to be used in Canada and only the second to be implemented in an ICU – the first is currently in use at St. Michael’s Hospital, in Toronto.
The portable MRI, called the Swoop, is produced by Hyperfine Inc., in the United States and distributed in Canada by Upcare Partners of Toronto.
Dedicated to head exams, it’s expected to have a sizeable impact on the quality of care for KHSC patients. It’s also going to deliver some impressive cost-savings.
On the quality front, it means that ICU patients – who are often afflicted with strokes and bleeds – can be imaged right at the bedside instead of being transported to the radiology department.
This is significant, as ICU patients are very sick and have multiple IV lines, wires and catheters attached to them; getting to the radiology department with these intact is both challenging and time consuming.
The various lines must be carefully removed or re-jigged for transport and special care must be taken in the imaging suite. It is well documented in medical literature that complications occur during transport of sick ICU patients.
“Patient transport is inherently risky, even inside a hospital,” said Dr. Omar Islam, head, Radiology at KHSC. Studies have shown, he noted, that 26 percent to 45 percent of ICU patients who are transported within hospitals suffer an adverse event.
“With all the lines, tubes and catheters involved, things can go wrong,” he commented.
It’s far better for patient safety, he said, to be able to provide an MRI exam on
neuro patients at the bedside in the ICU. Their lines can stay intact, the frail patients don’t have to be moved, and the Hyperfine Swoop stroke exam can be done in a few minutes. A full brain scan is completed in approximately 40 minutes, supervised by a single doctor, nurse or technologist.
That contrasts with 90 minutes that’s needed in the MRI imaging suite, where time is required to position the patient and to adjust the various lines and catheters.
The imaging suite also involves the participation of a whole team of nurses, respiratory therapists, technologists and porters.
Dr. Islam and his team were instrumental in bringing the first Hyperfine Swoop
to Canada. The machine – which looks like the R2D2 character from the Star Wars movies – was delivered to the Weeneebayko General Hospital in Moose Factory, Ont., in 2021.
It’s a remote location where patients often had to be flown by Medevac to Timmins or Kingston to obtain an MRI confirming a stroke or other neurological condition.
Dr. Islam learned about the Swoop at a medical conference in the United States and worked with the company, colleagues at Weeneebayko General, fellow researchers, elders in Moose Factory, and Health Canada to bring Canada’s first portable MRI into use.
So, instead of flying patients to larger hospitals, the MRI exams could be done locally, in Moose Factory, and the files could be sent electronically to neuroradiologists at KHSC and Queen’s University. It turned out to be a much easier process for patients and a much more cost-effective one.
The 18-month long project proved so successful that Weeneebayko General has acquired the device for ongoing use, thanks to a donor who provided the funding.
The Hyperfine Swoop costs approximately $600,000, but is projected to save the Weeneebayko General Hospital $7.8 million over five years – mostly in transport-related and nursing costs.
“It costs roughly $17,000 to transport each patient,” said Dr. Islam. He noted that a nurse must also accompany each neuro patient when Medevac flights are arranged, meaning the further loss of a trained healthcare provider at Weeneebayko for up to several days.
“There was already a nurse shortage in Moose Factory,” noted Dr. Islam. By administering the MRI exams at the pointof-care with the Swoop, nurses can remain on-site, continuing to provide care to local patients.
Due to its far northern location, on the shores of James Bay, inclement weather was also a constant hazard. Before using the Swoop, stroke patients at Weeneebayko General were sometimes detained by bad weather – snow storms or heavy ice meant that Medevac flights could be delayed for days at a time.
Of course, in the case of strokes, time is of the essence, and the earlier the patient is diagnosed and treated, the better. For this reason, and the others cited, the portable MRI will be a game changing addition.
Dr. Islam asserted the Swoop will be just
Room mock-ups fine-tune the features of the new Niagara hospital
BY ANTONIETTA CULIC
There’s a warehouse in Welland, Ontario where eight hospital rooms have been built to scale with a full suite of real furniture, fixtures, equipment and finishes. While they look like they could be the set of the next major hospital television drama, their purpose is far more important and vital. They are mock-up rooms for the new South Niagara Hospital (SNH), and they have played a key role in the design development process and helping teams at Niagara Health to confirm important design decisions about the future hospital.
Located in Niagara Falls, the 1.3-million-square-foot SNH will be a state-ofthe-art facility, offering a full scope of services including emergency, critical care, diagnostic, therapeutic and surgical services, as well as Centres of Excellence in complex care, wellness in aging, and stroke.
Construction began in July 2023, and
since then, Niagara Health and partners have been working closely with the team at EllisDon Infrastructure Healthcare (EDIH) to finalize the design.
The room mock-ups have played an important role in this process, giving Niagara Health users an opportunity to walk through and review real physical spaces, run mock-scenarios, and ensure that the room layouts of the new hospital will support the day-to-day operational needs of this exciting new facility.
Recognizing that healthcare is constantly evolving, the SNH was designed to be flexible, adaptable and responsive to changing demands, while also planning for ways to incorporate future technologies that cannot even be envisioned today.
When it opens in 2028, the SNH will introduce technologies and innovations, some of which are new to Niagara Health, that will help to increase workplace efficiencies, enhance environmental leadership, and most importantly improve the patient and staff experience.
It was important to the Redevelop-
ment Team to test some of these features in the mock-up spaces and provide staff with an opportunity to envision how these enhancements will impact the future of healthcare.
Niagara Health recently made a significant investment in patient care when
in late 2024 it launched a new Hospital Information System (HIS).
This new HIS will be integrated into the other technology systems at the SNH, and many examples can be seen throughout the mock-up spaces.
In patient bedrooms, digital signage at the door will be connected to the hospi-
tal information system, used to identify important patient information for staff.
Smartboards in bedrooms will also be integrated with the HIS to display information for patients, such as appointment times or discharge instructions.
Charting stations in each room will help improve efficiencies and reduce errors by allowing staff to input information right at the patient’s bedside.
There will be 469 patient bedrooms in the SNH, and each one will be completely private, improving the hospital experience for patients and visitors, while also decreasing the risk of infection spread.
There will be a number of smart hospital features, including smart beds, which are capable of wirelessly sending bed statuses to the nurse call system. Staff can be notified if a patient were to fall out of bed, or for those who are at risk of wandering.
An integrated bedside terminal (IBT) will help improve the patient experience.
KHSC head radiologist Dr. Omar Islam with the new Hyperfine Swoop, still in its delivery crate.
Rendition of the new South Niagara Hospital.
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Acid test for new tech
dence-based approach to personalized care,” he said.
The J&J leader also discussed an advanced wound closure solution that has the potential to reduce infection rates, improving the patient experience in proce-
dures as varied as knee replacement and Caesarian section deliveries.
The approach may help patients spend less time in hospital and recover more quickly with the benefit of reducing surgical site infections and associated costs and patient impact.
It’s not only these advanced solutions, technological hardware, and software that produces innovation, the speakers
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stressed. The legislative and regulatory framework is also a big factor.
Minister Jones observed that the patient experience in Ontario has been vastly improved by the expansion of the scope of practice for pharmacists and midwives, for example.
“We have to let professionals work at the highest level possible,” said Jones. A great example of this, she said, has been
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the expansion of scope of practice for pharmacists, enabling them to diagnose certain medical conditions and prescribe medications for them.
“If patients don’t have a family doctor, and the only option was the ER, the pharmacist can now be an option,” she said.
“We don’t want to discourage anyone from the ER, but we want them to have choices.”
Another example, she stated, can be found with midwives.
They’re now allowed to order certain lab tests. “Instead of waiting for a primary care doctor to order the tests, midwives can now do it.”
These regulatory changes are improving the experience of patients. “They’re also building capacity in the healthcare system,” said Jones, as patient flow is improved.
Partnerships among the key players –government, providers, and industry – are necessary for innovation and high-quality care to take place, the speakers agreed.
Medtech Canada’s Nicole DeKort gave a personal example. She was recently diagnosed with breast cancer.
“I had just turned 50, and it was caught early,” said DeKort.
She said the government-sponsored screening program, high-quality mammography, and skilled professionals all combined to spot the tumour in its earliest stage. “By the time I would have been able to feel it, my outcome wouldn’t have been as positive as it is today.”
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Hypercare desktop app and may, in future, be able to use Hypercare on hospital-supplied cell phones.
Senders can also attach photos or documents to their messages. “A trainee, for example, might attach a photo of a patient’s rash or send a photo of an X-ray showing a bad break to a staff physician, and it’s secure,” Dr. Jessa said. “You can’t do that with a pager, so that’s another benefit.”
So far, the Hypercare system is restricted to SickKids staff but as a cloud-based solution independent of the hospital’s other systems, community pediatricians and physicians who work at other hospitals as well as SickKids can also be included in the app’s directory. That would give community pediatricians an opportunity to reach out to a specialist for an emergency consult and would make sense, but “that’s a discussion for another day,” said Dr. Jessa.
Hospital staff accustomed to the convenience of using cell phones outside the hospital and in their personal lives have welcomed the acquisition of Hypercare and are not sorry to give up their pagers.
Hypercare is now deployed as a communication and on-call scheduling application at more than 30 hospitals across Canada. The deployment at SickKids is the company’s largest to date, said Hypercare CEO Albert Tai.
Researchers use high-powered imaging to track human microbiome
BY DAHLIA REICH
LONDON, ONT. – In a world first, scientists at Lawson Research Institute are leveraging imaging technology to see and track microbes and provide an unprecedented glimpse of the human microbiome.
Within each of us is a world populated by a bustling metropolis of microorganisms – a tapestry of trillions in a delicate dance to balance health, well-being and vitality.
Far outnumbering human cells, this dynamic ecosystem of busy bacteria, indus-
trious fungi and elusive viruses is the body’s microbiome. This invisible hive of ceaseless activity is so intrinsic to human health, its explorers say it should perhaps be considered an organ in its own right.
Now, in a world first, Lawson Health Research scientists studying this microcosmic underworld are making the invisible visible – in real-time.
The team of Jeremy Burton, PhD, research chair of human microbiome and probiotics and director of the Canadian Centre for Human Microbiome and Probiotic Research at St. Joseph’s Health Care London (St. Joseph’s), is using imaging technology to see and track microbes, providing a perspective never before achieved.
“Typically, we track microbes by analyzing samples from patients after treatment to improve their gut health with probiotics or fecal microbiota transplantation (FMT),” said Burton, whose endowed research chair is funded through St. Joseph’s Health Care Foundation.
“While we can get detailed information through DNA sequencing techniques, this often takes many months and relies on collecting fecal samples and other samples that may not be easily obtained. It also doesn’t provide all the information we need, like exactly where the microbes have travelled and how long they live.”
Imaging the microbes allows the Lawson team “to see things in real-time and not worry about clinical samples,” he added.
Donna Goldhawk, PhD, molecular imaging scientist with Lawson’s Imaging
Research Program, explains that imaging is done by attaching a radioactive tracer to cells, such as bacteria, that can be ingested and visualized in the body with positron emission tomography-magnetic resonance imaging (PET/MRI).
Imagine it as a biological version of an AirTag that tracks specific microbes.
“It’s through this pipeline that we gain fantastic insight into how the microbiome supports human health,” she said.
As an example, tracking microbes allows the scientists to see if they are close to or crossing over the gut cell wall.
“This is critical information because the proximity of microbes to the cell wall will likely determine if the probiotic or FMT therapy is effective or not,” said Burton. “We can now potentially track microbes that we administer to people in real-time and, in the future, be able to tell how sick people are and if they have a dysfunctional microbiota. Eventually, this information will be linked to their other health information for a complete picture.”
Burton notes the work “could only hap-
Jeremy Burton, PhD, and colleague Shannon Seney.
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Catching
infections before they happen to stop post-surgical infections
BY LISE DIEBEL
Hamilton Health Sciences (HHS) surgeons are testing an artificial intelligence tool that can catch signs of life-threatening complications early in patients recovering from certain colorectal, liver and pancreatic surgeries.
This innovative AI tool, created by Waterloo medtech company FluidAI Medical, could also save hospitals hundreds of thousands of dollars by reducing the need for certain medical tests, emergency department visits and readmissions.
“Through partnerships like this, we’re bringing leading-edge innovations to HHS hospital sites that have a profound impact on patient care by saving and prolonging lives,” said Dr. Ted Scott, vice president of innovation and partnerships for HHS.
FluidAI is testing its Stream Platform AI
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system, including its proprietary Origin device, in an international trial with HHS, the primary hospital leading this innovation. Other hospitals in the study are partnering with HHS.
The tool specializes in the early detection of potentially deadly leaks of bowel contents, like fecal matter or bile, into the abdominal cavity and blood stream in the days following surgery. Such post-surgical leaks sometimes happen when sections of bowel or bile duct have been cut and reattached, and sutures accidentally come loose.
This complication, called an anastomotic leak, happens in about 20 percent of pancreatic resection surgeries, said Dr. Pablo E. Serrano, an HHS surgeon leading the trial. “Of that 20 percent, five percent of patients will die from complications from the leak, such as infections or sepsis, so it’s a very serious problem.”
Fifteen percent of liver resections will have a bile leak after surgery, and five percent of bowel resections will leak. There are two parts to the FluidAI Stream Platform – the Origin sensor platform to analyze fluid in real-time, and a Delta monitor at the patient’s bedside that interprets and shows continuous data as it’s collected.
During an operation, the surgeon places a drainage system, which includes
the sensor platform, close to where the bowel or bile duct has been reattached. This platform uses pH (acidity) and electrical conductivity sensors to analyze postsurgical fluid in real-time to determine if there’s a higher risk of leakage.
The system also uses Epic, HHS’ stateof-the-art electronic medical records system, to help evaluate risk by incorporating parameters from the patient’s history, surgical details, and routine post-operative information such as age, blood loss during surgery and number of blood transfusions, into its analysis.
“If a high risk for leakage is determined, the surgeon is immediately notified through the Epic system and can intervene early to prevent or manage infections,” said Dr. Serrano.
The current standard of practice is to diagnose a post-surgical infection based on symptoms, such as a fever and abdominal pain. But symptoms often take several days to appear, often showing up after patients have been discharged from hospital and are recovering at home.
According to FluidAI’s research, it takes 8.8 days on average from the onset of symptoms to diagnosis with the current standard of practice. During that time, a patient may undergo tests including blood work, cultures, X-rays and CT scans, and may also be readmitted to hospital.
HHS surgeon Dr. Pablo Serrano at the bedside.
Get ready for joint replacements, other implants that transmit data
BY JERRY ZEIDENBERG
TORONTO – Medical innovator Dr. Bill Hunter points out that a revolution in medical technology is occurring, including sleek, multiarmed surgical robots from Intuitive Surgical, Medtronic, Zimmer Biomet and others that are being steadily deployed by ORs around the world.
However, the follow-up procedure for most patients hasn’t changed in years – it’s an old-fashioned, analog process.
“We’re still using questionnaires to ask patients after their surgeries, ‘How are you feeling’,” said Dr. Hunter. “We’re doing things in the operating room down to the micrometer, but we’re following up afterwards with the equivalent of a sextant.”
Dr. Hunter was the keynote speaker at a medical innovation conference held at Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre last October.
His company, Canary Medical, of Vancouver, is aiming to change the antiquated procedures used in surgical follow-ups and monitoring.
Canary produces smart implants that can be placed into surgical sites to automatically measure how the patient is recovering from surgery. Instead of the patient trying to tell the doctor about their recovery at encounters a few times a year, the implant transmits data to the care team each and every day.
One of the company’s latest inventions is the Canary canturio te, a short metal extension that’s inserted into Zimmer’s smart knee replacement.
This small knee extension contains a
V3D-accelerometer, 3D gyroscope and pedometer, a memory board and transmitter. It also has a battery that’s designed to last 20 years. Altogether, the implant can gather data showing how a patient is faring after knee surgery, compared to other patients.
Data is gathered throughout the day and uploaded to the cloud at night.
It can tell doctors whether the patient is on the road to a good recovery or not. If the patient isn’t doing well, the data can help the clinician determine how recovery could be improved.
“A physiotherapist can get on a Zoom call with the patient and show him what to do,” said Dr. Hunter. “If you don’t, the patient may never fully recover and could end up back on the operating table.”
He noted that in orthopedic surgeries, the failure rate is still at 20 percent.
The Canary canturio te is designed to catch that 20 percent faster than before and to alert clinicians.
At the same time, the device could radically improve workflow and capacity in the healthcare system. He observed that an orthopedic practice in Atlanta, for example, performs about 1,000 joint replacements annually. They have their patients come in for follow-ups four times a year.
“That’s 4,000 encounters, but 80 percent of the patients will recover normally,” said Dr. Hunter. “Now, you can follow the patient digitally.”
He explained that surgeons could instead focus on the 800 patients who are having trouble, while continuing to monitor the others electronically. That elimi-
Dr. Bill Hunter holds Canary Medical’s extension.
nates 3,200 office visits – something that’s better for the patient experience, for clinicians and for payors.
“If you don’t positively affect workflow and workload, you won’t succeed,” said Dr. Hunter, offering advice to other medical technology entrepreneurs in the auditorium.
Canary’s canturio te is just one of a series of smart implants the company intends to introduce. They’re being designed for other orthopedic joints, and for other medical problems, such as heart failure.
On this front, Canary recently ran a small trial of a heart implant that measures the sounds of the mitral valve, comparing them to sounds from normal valves as a way of spotting problems.
The data is again transmitted and monitored remotely, alerting clinicians to the possibility of a problem.
Dr. Hunter discussed the exciting potential of bringing artificial intelligence into the equation. “When you’ve collected a billion data points, you can do predictive medicine,” he said.
For example, you can even predict strokes from the gait of a patient with an orthopedic implant. “The gait of these patients changes,” said Dr. Hunter. “Walking requires a normal neurological system, a normal respiratory system, and a normal musculoskeletal system.”
Regarding joint replacements, he said that algorithms can be developed to detect which patients are on the road to a good recovery and which ones are not. “With the ones who are not, you can treat them much more aggressively,” he said.
ChatGPT and other forms of advanced AI could even be used on the patient side to help at home. “A patient could ask, ‘Siri, how’s my knee replacement doing’,” to better understand his or her own health.
Dr. Hunter commented on the business case for automated monitoring of post-surgical patients. “If 80 percent of patients will recover well, do they really need four follow-ups a year?”, he asked.
Moreover, in the United States, 72 percent of post-surgical orthopedic patients receive homecare, but only 20 percent of them need it.
Implants such as the ones created by Canary could change the economics of the healthcare system, dramatically reducing the need for post-operative care and providing massive savings.
Researchers refine the tissue-tracking ability of surgical robots
ANCOUVER – Surgeons need a detailed view of tissues when performing complex, non-invasive procedures using robot assistance, making advances in tissue imaging computer software essential to minimize errors.
The Surgical Tattoos in Infrared (STIR) technology designed by Vancouver Coastal Health Research Institute researcher Dr. Tim Salcudean and Dr. Adam Schmidt provides a novel way to evaluate tissue tracking algorithms, setting the stage for future advances in image-guided and automated surgeries.
“Tissues have repetitive textures that can prove problematic for computer algorithms used in robot-assisted surgeries to accurately track,” said Dr. Schmidt.
Schmidt and Salcudean’s research, carried out in collaboration with Intuitive Surgical, the makers of da Vinci robotic surgery systems, was published in IEEE Transactions on Medical Imaging.
The study releases a dataset to enable any researcher to evaluate how well their tissue tracking computer algorithms are able to track the movements of various tissue types viewed through a da Vinci Xi robot.
For their study, Salcudean and
Schmidt tested STIR on three baseline algorithms.
The da Vinci Xi is a robotic surgical system used in endoscopy – a procedure that involves the insertion of a small video camera-mounted rigid endoscope stick and instruments to view and operate inside of the body in a minimally invasive manner.
Surgeons using the da Vinci Xi sit in front of a console with ‘stereo video’ goggles showing real-time three-dimensional video of interior tissues. They manipulate the machine’s ‘arms’ to control the movement of the video cameramounted scope and surgical tools.
Tissue tracking and mapping software augments the surgical process further by superimposing images on top of the stereo video display to, for example, highlight target tissues, such as tumours.
“Computer software gives surgeons a view beyond that of the endoscopic camera, such as vasculature and other areas that surgeons want to avoid, as well as highlighting the tissues to be removed,” says Salcudean.
However, software errors or blind spots can lead to the surgical removal of healthy tissues, with potential downsides for patient outcomes and recovery times.
The STIR approach designed by Schmidt and Salcudean involved tattooing onto tissues non-toxic, near-infrared dyes invisible to the human eye, but viewable through the da Vinci Xi system’s monitor, or similar specialized equipment. The system captures both near-infrared and visible light spectrum video, which made it possible for the research team to toggle between both in a single recording.
The tissue types examined were pork chop, aorta, beef tongue, chicken heart,
pig heart, chicken breast, pork stomach, pork intestine and pork spleen. Two in vivo porcine studies were also conducted.
“To enable a similar lighting environment to that found in a surgical setting, we placed tissues into a body model that replicates the lighting found when per-
forming surgery in the torso.”
Near-infrared dyes were tattooed in multiple places on each tissue sample. Researchers then recorded tissue manipulation and movement, toggling between the near-infrared and visible light views. Simulated tissue manipulations ranged from total movement to stretching and squishing, as well as camera movements, palpation, cutting, tearing and both instruments and other tissues obscuring the view of the camera.
Because the computer algorithms tested were only able to track tissues from the visible light footage, researchers could compare their performance against the footage with the invisible light annotated dye markings to determine the algorithms’ accuracy.
While the team proved STIR to be a reliable approach to evaluate the performance of tissue-tracking algorithms, they also discovered that most algorithms had flaws that made their ability to track tissues inadequate for the clinical setting, says Schmidt.
“Accuracy levels dropped significantly when the image was obscured by a tool or other tissues, for example. Large tissue movements also resulted in reductions in accuracy.”
Improving the tracking abilities of robots.
Unattached patients: key lessons to transform access to care
Unattached patients have trouble accessing timely care and specialists. They also put pressure on EDs.
BY MARK CASSELMAN
Unattached patients, people without a regular primary care provider, pose a significant challenge in healthcare systems worldwide. According to a 2024 report by the Canadian Institute for Health Information (CIHI), 17 percent of Canadian adults, over 5 million individuals, lack consistent access to primary care.
This gap leaves patients vulnerable to delays, inequities, and fragmented care, leading to poorer health outcomes and higher costs.
Recent provincial digital health initiatives and research provides valuable insights into addressing this issue, highlighting innovative strategies and systemic changes. Below, we explore five key lessons, offering a roadmap for healthcare professionals, policymakers, and innovators.
Primary care access points are key: Centralized access points are a transformative solution for unattached patients. Programs like Quebec’s Guichet d’accès à la première ligne (GAP) exemplify this approach, serving as single points of entry to primary care.
Unattached patients often report frustration with fragmented care, longer wait times, and the need to repeatedly explain their medical history at walk-in clinics. One patient noted, “Without a family doctor, it’s hard to get referrals or follow-up care. I often feel lost in the system.”
Programs like GAP address these challenges by streamlining access, reducing bottlenecks, and connecting patients to care. Powered by the Akinox Linx platform, GAP processed over 2 million orientation requests and assigned more than 770,000 medical
appointments in one year, with 70 percent of requests processed within 36 hours.
Importantly, connecting unattached patients with the right resource can avoid unnecessary visits to the Emergency Room to access care. Expanding such centralized access points across Canada could significantly reduce these challenges, particularly in underserved areas.
Interprofessional collaboration enhances care: Addressing the needs of unattached patients requires collaboration among healthcare professionals. Inter-
Connecting unattached patients with the right resources can reduce pressure on emergency departments and speed up care.
professional collaboration involves physicians, nurses, allied health professionals, and other stakeholders working together to deliver comprehensive care.
A 2023 study by Breton et al., conducted using the Akinox Linx platform, highlighted the value of team-based care models in improving outcomes for unattached patients. These models provide holistic care, particularly for patients with chronic conditions, by coordinating treatment plans across physical, mental, and social health needs.
Breaking down silos between healthcare professionals is critical. Organizations must foster teamwork and invest in infrastructure that supports integrated care.
Evaluation and scalability are necessary: Programs aimed at improving access for unattached patients must be designed with scalability in mind. Research protocols outlined by Breton et al. (2023) stress the importance of evaluating the effectiveness of initiatives like single points of access. These evaluations ensure successful models can be adapted and expanded across different regions.
Programs demonstrating positive outcomes on a smaller scale should be equipped with the resources to scale up. This includes analyzing costs, adapting to regional variations, and securing stakeholder buyin. Without scalability, even effective solutions may remain localized, limiting their broader impact.
Equity-focused interventions are critical: Equity must be central to efforts addressing unattached patients. Many belong to marginalized populations, including immigrants, low-income groups, and rural residents.
A 2024 study by Mathews et al. highlights compounded barriers faced by these populations, such as language barriers, geographic isolation, and systemic discrimination. Equityfocused interventions, like culturally sensitive care models and communitybased programs, are essential to ensuring these patients are not left behind.
Transforming radiology with Microsoft Cloud for Healthcare
Many radiologists already use speech recognition software to dictate reports, but advancements in AI-powered, cloudbased speech introduce new efficiencies. Advanced, radiology-specific AI can help minimize recognition errors that are common in legacy solutions and slow radiologists down with the need for constant corrections. It can also transform free form dictation into automatically structured reports, so radiologists can dictate in their preferred style while the AI helps create a standardized report.
PowerScribe One, now part of Microsoft Cloud for Healthcare, is one Microsoft radiology solution that has been revolutionizing the reporting experience for decades. The solution combines the power of structured data, AI-driven workflows, and cloud-hosted speech technology to help radiologists create accurate, high-quality reports in less time.
As the trusted reporting platform
of the future, PowerScribe One supports interoperability standards, drives intelligent automation, and serves as an adaptable foundation to integrate the latest ambient, generative, and pixel AI advancements. But with the rise of AI in radiology, how can organizations confidently measure their performance and quality?
Beyond report creation, Microsoft Cloud for Healthcare also empowers radiology teams and their organizations to unlock value from their data. mPower Clinical Analytics, also part of Microsoft Cloud for Healthcare, is a HITRUST CSF-certified and SOCII compliant solution built on Azure. This user-friendly solution provides radiology teams with actionable insights from reports and other clinical data – helping organizations to optimize clinical and financial outcomes, improve quality and compliance, and reduce operational costs. By integrating with various data sources, mPower Clinical
Analytics surfaces important information and recommendations to support quality improvement initiatives, population health management, value-based care, and regulatory reporting.
Trained on over a billion reports and with over 120 algorithms to
mPower Clinical Analytics provides radiology teams with actionable insights from reports and other data.
identify and track critical result compliance, mPower Clinical Analytics harnesses the power of cloud and AI to help paint a clear picture of clinical performance, facilitate consistent follow-up recommendations, and drive case volume and revenue by optimizing workflows and merging performance data with quality metrics.
As imaging volumes grow and healthcare organizations adapt to meet new demands, mPower Clinical Analytics provides scalability and elasticity to handle large and complex data sets to drive better information awareness, availability, and access. mPower Clinical Analytics and PowerScribe One are just two solutions of Microsoft Cloud for Healthcare that are transforming the way radiology teams work. Outside of the reading room, radiologists spend a significant amount of time on tasks that are unrelated to image interpretation and report creation. From supporting a tumour board conference to drafting a grant proposal, radiologists can use AI in their everyday business applications like Teams, Word, and Outlook to boost productivity.
Learn more about AI’s impact inside and outside the reading room: RSNA 2024: AI’s impact inside and outside the reading room - Microsoft Industry Blogs.
Mark Casselman is Chief Growth Officer at Akinox.
Enterprise Imaging Cloud
Digital pathology? Canadian hospitals and health regions are testing the solutions
There are incredible benefits to digital pathology, including the assistance of AI tools.
ABY DIANNE DANIEL
fter launching their transition to a digital pathology platform last year, pathologists at Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre, in Toronto, are spending less time peering at glass slides through a microscope and more time in front of their computer screens – sometimes from the comfort of home.
They’re accessing specimens faster and it’s expected that the vast majority, if not all, surgical pathology slides will be virtual as early as spring.
“We tend to adopt a ‘Start low, go slow’ approach,” said Dr. Michelle Downes, division head of anatomic pathology at Sunnybrook, adding the goal is to get the bulk of the workflow up and running smoothly before rolling out additional scanning functionality to support fluorescent images or cytology specimens in the future.
To start, the pathology lab is focusing on hematoxylin and eosin (H&E) stained slides and is operating a dual workflow so pathologists have the option of continuing to receive glass slides as they acclimatize to the digital environment.
“Surgical pathology is the lion’s share of what we do, so if we can get that up and running, then that’s really advantageous,” added Dr. Downes.
The digital pathology platform includes whole slide scanners, an on-site image storage repository backed up in the cloud, and image management software from Fujifilm called Synapse Pathology. It is integrated into the pathology information system so that the lab’s 16 expert pathologists can easily access and review the roughly 1,000 images scanned each day for in-house cases.
As Dr. Downes described, the lab send-out bench has traditionally been the slowest point in the workflow. Scanning – which runs autonomously once the slides are prepared and loaded by technicians – not only improves efficiency but has the added advantage of providing flexibility, enabling pathologists to access images without having to be physically onsite in the lab, meaning they can work from home.
“Moving forward, that’s something that’s going to be really important in terms of recruiting and retaining staff,” she said.
To date the launch has gone smoothly. One reason is that the implementation team spent 10 months
upfront to develop the pre-analytic component of the workflow, testing and tweaking slides to ensure high-quality scans at go-live.
Sunnybrook manager of anatomic pathology and laboratory information services, Tanya Jorden, said they focused on engaging technical staff early on by offering online courses and providing opportunities to visit other sites where digital pathology is in use, so they understood the important correlation between good quality slides and good quality scans.
BThey are currently achieving high-quality images at a lower resolution than anticipated, freeing up storage space, she added.
“To be honest, within a couple of weeks (after launch) I already had pathologists saying, ‘I don’t need my slides anymore,’” said Jorden. “A lot of them embraced this technology much quicker than I was expecting.”
Dr. Downes is using the digital workflow, both from the office and at home. She hasn’t encountered any issues, and says the biggest change was adapting to the larger field of view and the fact that she no longer has to adjust the focus each time she zooms in and out. Ergonomics are also improved because she can sit back in her chair as opposed to hunching forward over a microscope.
Sunnybrook expects to see more gains down the road as they advance their digital pathology platform over the next few years, including the addition of AI tools to aid in decision making. One challenge is that they’ve encountered difficulty integrating the image management system to the lab information system.
Another is that slides arriving from healthcare centres in the province for consult don’t conform to the same pre-analytical standards used in-house. When they scan external cases, they often encounter variability such as the intensity of the staining or the addition of the coverslip, leading to a higher re-scan rate.
“Ultimately, what you’d like is for community hospitals to have their own scanners on-site where they could scan them locally and upload to us,” said Dr. Downes.
Overall, she offers three key take-away messages to other institutions preparing to embark on a digital pathology journey: it has to be a team approach; take
Osler pilots digital pathology using Sectra’s solution
RAMPTON, ONT. – William Osler Health System (Osler) is heading into 2025 with the next step in its 10-year enterprise imaging strategy off to a great start: the successful launch of a digital pathology pilot.
The project builds on Osler’s relationship with imaging IT provider, Sectra, adding digital pathology functionality to the digitized diagnostic imaging workflow that’s already in place.
It is focused on tissue biopsies from the gastrointestinal (GI) tract that are currently being reviewed and reported by two surgical pathologists.
“GI biopsies are about 20 to 30 percent of total specimens Osler receives, so there’s an opportunity to start small and then ramp up to the point where we’re doing up to a third of our workflow digitally,” said Osler’s GI pathology lead, Dr. Sameer Shivji, one of the pathologists using the new system.
Preparing for the launch was a multi-disciplinary collaboration
from the start, and it included representatives from Osler’s IT, histology, pathology, surgical, oncology and administrative teams. Lab technologists took extra courses to learn how to prepare slides for scanning and a validation phase was held ahead of the December 2024 ‘go live’, during which time cases already reviewed using a microscope were reviewed digitally to test for concordance.
As Osler laboratory information system consultant Andra Magopat explained, the test environment already in place for diagnostic imaging was updated to include the digital pathology component from Sectra. After new scanning equipment was installed, it served as a digital sandbox, providing an opportunity to work out issues and adjust processes prior to going live with patient cases.
“Because we had everybody in the room from the beginning, we were able to work together and get past the challenges of implementing a pilot,” said Magopat, adding that
vendor support was also important to ensure workflows catered to the centre’s needs.
Osler’s digital pathology pilot has laid a strong foundation and Dr. Shivji sees the potential for AI to assist with manual or repetitive tasks or to serve as a decision support tool.
Depending on the type of case, Dr. Shivji is finding it easier and
Before launching its pilot, Osler made sure to involve people from various parts of the hospital.
quicker to go through slides digitally, make accurate and reproducible measurements, and to maintain good resolution when viewing images at different magnifications. Moreover, he’s excited about future functionality to come.
“Digital pathology is part of Osler’s larger push towards innova-
tion and precision medicine,” he said, adding that tools like digital pathology, next generation sequencing and liquid biopsies are all working together to advance patient care and improve outcomes.
“Within the Sectra system, I can also call upon digital imaging, so if I get a biopsy I can look at the X-ray, for example, and check if what I’m seeing under the microscope – or on the monitor these days – actually matches,” he said. “That increased collaboration is one major thing that will help to improve patient care.”
Nader Soltani, president at Sectra Canada, is equally excited about the impact of this technology. “We are thrilled to see Sectra’s digital pathology solution having a positive impact in real-world clinical settings,” he said. “By seamlessly combining imaging, pathology, and other diagnostic tools, we aim to empower healthcare professionals with the insights needed to make more informed decisions, ultimately improving patient outcomes.”
time to get the pre-analytics right; and don’t be distracted by what others are doing, but do what’s right for your use case, which is unique to you.
A 2024 report by Markets and Markets forecast the global digital pathology market to reach US$1.1 billion last year, growing to US$2 billion by 2029. Growth is primarily driven by rising demand for pathologists to review cases remotely and new opportunities for predictive analytics using AI algorithms. Hospitals are also looking to gain efficiency in the face of a rising prevalence of cancer cases.
In British Columbia, Provincial Laboratory Medicine Services (PLMS), a program of the Provincial Health Services Authority (PHSA), is currently hosting a testbed environment to explore a secure end-to-end digital pathology solution for the entire province. The effort is supported through B.C.’s Integrated Marketplace with Innovate B.C., the province and PacifiCan contributing funding in the amount of $2.65 million.
The journey started in 2022 when an innovation scan conducted by PLMS indicated that several provincial pathology labs were considering digital pathology as an important technology to pursue but were struggling to make a strong business case. PLMS stepped in as integrator to bring multiple teams together to define a collective path forward.
The result is a comprehensive reference architecture that outlines what the various components of a provincial system might look like, electronically connecting provincial pathology practices using a standard approach while respecting local interests and nuances at the same time.
“At the end we came out with documentation that the provincial health organizations could get behind. And when we were able to partner with Innovate B.C., it was an opportunity for us to say we have a plan for an end-to-end system, we’ve created this documentation, how can we stand it up in an environment that’s like a proof of concept?” said PLMS director, leading clinical initiatives and programs, Lise Matzke.
The reference architecture serves as a blueprint for creating that system, she added, including the hardware, software, cloud capabilities, governance and security.
The testbed environment is a development site that runs separate from live clinical systems. Pathologists enter the site, play with test cases, create annotations and provide feedback on the technology, which is sourced from B.C. companies.
The project is using an extensive set of key performance indicators (KPIs) and metrics so that the data collected can be analyzed and reported on in order to inform a future state system.
“What we’re attempting to do is set an environment where all of these practices will lean in on a defined set of structures associated with the reference architecture, but be able to use it in their own space,” explained PLMS chief provincial diagnostics officer Craig Ivany. “We didn’t want to find ourselves having to navigate eight different infrastructures or models in the province three to five years down the road. We wanted some semblance of standard approaches.”
The idea behind the testbed is to understand how a digital pathology workflow would operate across different health au-
thorities and health information systems, with the goal of eventually procuring standard equipment across the province. In addition to testing the movement of specimens across different settings, they are also exploring cutting-edge AI products designed to find efficiencies in workflow.
“We’re really looking at it as a full ecosystem strategy as opposed to having
six or seven different silos emerge and then trying to figure out how to connect them,” said Ivany.
Another goal of the collaborative approach is to “level the field,” he added, meaning every pathologist will be able to access the same tools and capabilities required to help them work as effectively and efficiently as possible.
“The trajectory for pathology is significantly increasing and the challenge for all of our pathologists is to have as many tools at their disposal to ensure that quality patient care is achieved in a timely fashion,” he said. That capability is crucial, “regardless of where you live in the province and regardless of how that medical practice is structured.”
Global MedTech presence.
Dr. Eric Topol outlines AI’s transformation of medicine at the RSNA
BY JERRY ZEIDENBERG
Many observers are skeptical of AI in medicine, citing the hallucinations, biases and dead-wrong answers it sometimes provides. However, the technology continues to develop, and other experts attest to what AI has already accomplished and what’s in store for the future.
Dr. Eric Topol is clearly an AI optimist. In a fast-paced and informative keynote at the RSNA conference in Chicago, he outlined just how smart AI has become and how it’s quickly evolving.
Dr. Topol, founder of the Scripps Research Translational Institute in San Diego, Calif., and a best-selling author of books about medical technology – asserted that healthcare currently suffers from a problem in diagnosis – and that AI can fix it.
A group at Johns Hopkins University, he noted, recently conducted a study that found 800,000 Americans die each year or are permanently disabled by diagnostic errors. “That’s a lot of Americans who are hurt from diagnostic errors that we need to do something about, and hopefully AI will help us get there,” said Dr. Topol.
In a talk peppered with examples and references to studies, he noted how AI has had many success stories.
He also pointed to the technological changes that are going on within AI –how it has moved from being uni-modal – meaning it deals with one source of data at a time – to a multi-modal format, handling many sources of data to provide an answer.
He said that most of the gains in applying AI to radiology have been uni-modal –the solutions look at the chest, lungs, liver, or breasts, for example, and find potential problems.
Typically, AI apps have done this by analyzing just one source of truth – such as an X-ray, a set of CT images or MRI exams.
However, the next phase of AI, using multi-modal models, will look at various
author and cardiologist Dr. Eric
streams of data, including the longitudinal electronic health record along with other sources, to make diagnoses and assessments.
Dr. Topol said the biggest randomized trial in AI today is the mammography trial from Sweden of 80,000 women, half of whom had AI plus interpretation from radiologists, while the other half had assessments by radiologists alone. Significantly, the AI plus radiologists had a higher pickup rate for breast cancer as well as reduced time for workflow – an important success story for uni-modal AI.
And while medical AI has made its earliest gains in radiology, Dr. Topol pointed out that the technology is quickly moving into other areas.
“Gastroenterologists are really into this,” he said. “They are using more and more machine vision during endoscopy. And not only are they picking up more polyps, but they’re also more able to detect whether they’re likely to be cancerous.
High-powered imaging tracks microbiome
ideas, collaborations and many Canadian firsts.”
“There are now 44 randomized trials for AI in endoscopy, he said. A meta-analysis shows a 22 percent improvement in the detection of polyps and adenomas, and an inspection time increase of only 30 seconds.”
Patients are also using AI tools, he said, to keep a closer eye on their own health.
“This is an important thing that we don’t acknowledge enough. It’s that AI tools are enabling patient to self-diagnose.”
He cited examples of AI being deployed in consumer-level devices, enabling patients to detect:
• Abnormal heart rhythm (using smart watches)
• Skin lesions and rashes (using smartphone imaging)
• Urinary tract infections from a kit that can be bought in the pharmacy
• Ear infections in children – with a smartphone add-on
• And also in some grocery stores, the ability to detect diabetic retinopathy –which in half or more diabetics never gets screened and can lead to blindness.
In addition to the diagnostic abilities of AI, Dr. Topol spoke about its incredible predictive powers.
In his own specialty of cardiology, Dr. Topol said much can be learned using AI. “I’ve been reading cardiograms for a few decades; but I would never be able to tell you the sex and age of the patient! Or the ejection fraction within a few percent. And the hemoglobin, to the decimal point, from the cardiogram. Who would have guessed that would be possible?”
He continued, “You can also predict atrial fibrillation and stroke. Diabetes and pre-diabetes, from the echocardiogram, the filling pressure of the left ventricle, hyperthyroidism, and predicting kidney disease.”
Pathology is also getting heavily into artificial intelligence, said Dr. Topol.
“From a slide, you can detect the driver mutations, and whether it’s malignant or benign. Whether the site or origin can be identified, which is a problem in at least 5 percent of cancers. The structural genomic changes, the response to therapy and even the prognosis of the patient – all from a pathology slide alone and using machine eyes.”
Even simple chest X-ray exams contain a remarkable amount of information, when AI is attached to them.
pen here” at St. Joseph’s, with its leadingedge imaging, production of novel tracers (isotopes) within Lawson’s Cyclotron and PET Radiochemistry Facility, and with world-class collaborative expertise – all fueled by the generosity of donors.
Working with Burton and Goldhawk are Lawson scientists, Michael Kovacs, PhD, Frank Prato, PhD, Dr. Michael Silverman, Seema Nair Parvathy, PhD, and Neil Gelman, PhD.
“This exciting work illustrates how innovative technologies can emerge when diverse groups collaborate closely in a multi-disciplinary approach to research within a hospital setting,” said Michael Kovacs, program lead, Lawson’s Imaging Research Program, and lead, Cyclotron & PET Radiochemistry Facility. “Lawson’s environment has been a catalyst for new
The potential impact cannot be overstated, Burton asserted.
“This is the pathway to revolutionizing the way we understand the microbiome
Only relatively recently have we started to study the microbes that cause good health, rather than illness.
in people,” he said. “We’ve spent so long trying to eradicate microbes and studying the ones that cause ill health. Only relatively recently have we begun to study the ones that cause good health. That’s a dramatic shift in approach and, while we’ve come a long way, we’re really only getting started.”
Astonishingly, “from the eye tests, you’re also able to predict if the person will develop kidney disease, or liver and gall bladder disease.
“And from the vessels in the retina you can also detect the calcium score of vessels in the heart,” he said.
Moreover, he added, “It may also be possible to predict Alzheimer’s disease in people with no symptoms, 5-7 years before they’re diagnosed.”
From an AI-enabled eye exam, you can also predict heart attack and stroke, hyperlipidemia and Parkinson’s Disease, he asserted.
These aren’t simply sci-fi forecasts, but rather preliminary results that are grounded in real-world studies.
“These are all from separate studies showing things that we never expected we could get from the retinal image, using machine eyes,” said Dr. Topol.
“One thing that is particularly surprising is the chest X-ray, which doesn’t get enough respect,” Dr. Topol averred. “In a study published this year in Annals of Internal Medicine, chest X-rays enabled with AI have predicted 10-year heart attack, stroke and CV death better than the traditional ASCVD Risk Score.”
He noted the ASCVD is the gold standard, but the trial of chest X-ray analysis using AI was much more sensitive.
If AI does sometimes err, and needs human supervision, there appear to be other instances where AI is far superior to humans – which is perhaps a scary thought.
“We have to admit that AI does a really good job with text. For completeness, correctness and conciseness – 3 Cs, if you will,” said Dr. Topol. “If you look at the AI report versus the physician report, they are tighter, easier to understand, and they are more complete. We can benefit from that.”
This can occur in medical diagnosis, too. Dr. Topol cited a Google study which
Best-selling
Topol says artificial intelligence is now moving from a uni-modal format to analyzing data from multiple modalities.
compared AI versus a physician – and the AI performed better.
The study compared 26 different aspects and measured the performance of AI versus the physician alone. For 24 of them, the LLM was better. The aspects included communication, empathy, patient management plan, and many other markers of performance.
When this paper was covered by Nature, the headline was “Google AI has better bedside manner than human doctors –and makes better diagnoses.”
Curiously, another study found that ChatGPT was 90 percent accurate in diagnosing illness, but MDs + ChatGPT were only 76 percent accurate. MDs with no AI were 74 percent accurate. (This study was highly publicized last November, during the U.S. Thanksgiving holiday, with coverage on CNN.)
“That wasn’t the way it was supposed to work. It was supposed to be that the combined hybrid performance was going to be the best. Well, it turns out that there are five of these studies, all showing that AI does better alone than the physician with the AI,” he said.
Three of the studies were focused on radiologists, while two looked at internists and physicians.
Dr. Topol said we don’t really know why AI alone is more accurate than an MD equipped with AI.
He said there’s three potential explanations: first, that there’s a bias against automation (the physician doesn’t believe the findings of the AI); second, that physicians have never gotten grounded in the use of AI and aren’t comfortable using it; and the third is that these are contrived experiments and they’re not the real world.
Indeed, fewer than 5 percent of 500 reports to this effect use any real patient data. “So, these are preliminary findings that are not necessarily what we’re going to see when we look at real-world medicine, which is very different,” said Dr. Topol. “A lot of these studies make use of actors rather than real patients.
“And so, we wouldn’t want to conclude
yet that AI is better than the physician plus AI for these tasks,” he continued. “Because these are not real-world medical tasks.”
Dr. Topol moved on to discuss how AI will give us even higher levels of results.
This is where multimodal Large Language Models come in. They can integrate multiple layers of data that are now being collected – not just the genome, but also the transcriptome, proteome, metabolome, microbiome, epigenome and exposome, phenome, physiome and immunome.
“We have all these layers of data that haven’t been integrated. And previously, that have been hard to collect, period,” said Dr. Topol.
He’s calling this plethora of data ‘from pre-womb to tomb’, but a colleague told him a better tag would have been ‘from lust to dust’.
In any case, said Dr. Topol, the integration of this deep data helps to get us to what he calls ‘high resolution human beings’.
He cited a group in Israel, at the Weizmann Institute, led by Dr. Eran Segal. “They have done the most extraordinary thing by having over 15,000 participants with the most deep data acquisition ever made. And using it, they do a longitudinal assessment of almost everything you can imagine. And this is what we’ll be doing more of in the future.”
Dr. Topol said deep data of this sort will revolutionize the analysis, prediction and treatment of cancer.
“We can reboot cancer,” he said, “with AI. And we need to reboot cancer because screening now is completely unintelligent, based only on age – and we now know that there are many more young people that are developing cancer. We can also be smarter about diagnosing illness, he ventured. For example, of women undergoing mammography, only 12 percent develop cancer in their lifetime. Why do they all have to have frequent mammograms?”
Instead, said Dr. Topol, we should have layers of data to partition a person’s risk instead of sending everyone to the imaging
suite. This is a precision medicine approach – it could be called an accuracy medicine approach. “Much has been written about this, but not much has been done about it yet,” said Dr. Topol.
As an example, pancreatic cancer is a very difficult cancer to catch before the person is already at stage 3 or 4. To this end, Denmark has been mining its national electronic health record – and the VA in the US has been doing this, too – to determine a person’s risk of pancreatic cancer from their data.
“Generally, we’re not doing this and it captures many things that we miss,” said Dr. Topol. “Fluctuations in the lab values, non-specific complaints from the patient, and other things that we’re not harvesting.”
There is movement in this direction, however.
Sloan Kettering showed they could predict five different types of cancer from the electronic health record, said Dr. Topol. “They looked at the EHR and unstructured data, imaging, genomics, tumour
AI is now being used to analyze a plethora of data gathered on individuals throughout their lifespans, from “lust to dust”.
markers, stage and progression and treatment notes. In almost 25,000 patients they could obtain a prediction of cancer risk.”
Dr. Topol said there’s amazing potential for this type of medical forecasting, assisted by AI.
“If you take all these layers, the one that’s showing the most promise is plasma proteins. The fact that we can get plasma proteins – and there’s 5,000 to 11,000 of them, from just a couple millilitres of blood.”
He said there are at least two notable companies in this space, Olink from ThermoFisher and Somalogic that has Somascan. “We’re starting to see a revolution in proteomics. On top of the other layers, like the genomic sequence. Or the gut microbiome.”
And this quiet revolution is bringing new insights about human biology. For example, it’s now believed that each of our organs ages at a different pace, said Dr. Topol. Moreover, some people have one or more organs that are way out of line, which would denote them as high risk. Other insights in this vein include the fact that we don’t just age linearly – there are certain peaks at 35 to 40, and 60 and 80. Dr. Topol suggested there’s a connection between ‘causal proteins’ and aging in people.
While Dr. Topol emphasized the progress that’s being made in AI, he’s fully aware of the negative aspects of artificial intelligence. “There’s a study that came out from China that argues AI could worsen radiologist performance,” he said. “AI increased the odds of burnout and emotional exhaustion.”
At the RSNA meeting, radiologists were heard to complain about AI in their departments. Some were required to use it, but if they disagreed with its findings, a whole process was required to dispute the result. That is engendering stress amongst these radiologists, as they’re seeing incorrect results or misdiagnoses in their AI applications but it’s counterproductive to spend time arguing against the program. Dr. Topol also acknowledged the resistance to change in the medical community – many physicians are still wary of AI. More than this, he said, there’s also a fear of AI, too. “That it’s going to change the nature of the doctor patient relationship –which it might improve, but there’s also the threat of AI taking a much more primary role,” averred Dr. Topol. For that reason, some doctors don’t like it.
Still, developments are continuing in the application of Large Language Models to medical care. Just as the automobile superseded the horse and buggy, AI’s impact on healthcare may be an unstoppable juggernaut. And Dr. Topol certainly emphasized its positive aspects – such as improving the diagnosis of disease and providing better care plans. “AI is a real opportunity – that’s what I’m excited about, that’s what I’m hoping for,” he concluded.
Cloud-based communication system powered by TELUS and Avaya
adapting to the future of healthcare.”
With the new system, all communications – voice calls, video, messaging, and more – now run through TELUS’ private, secure network, processed and routed via dedicated, fully redundant TELUS data centres.
This high-tech solution frees the hospital from the complexities of infrastructure management, empowering more than 5,000 staff and physicians to connect seamlessly via mobile devices, computers, and office phones – all while maintaining the highest security standards.
The collaboration introduces a comprehensive, integrated communications platform, combining voice, video, chat, and messaging. This cutting-edge approach aligns with the hospital’s broader goal of leveraging technology to improve patient care and healthcare delivery.
A standout feature of this implementation was its cost-effectiveness. The hospital was able to retain its existing equipment, minimizing both operational disruption and expenses while unlocking new features and boosting reliability.
This compatibility with existing hardware demonstrates how healthcare institutions can modernize their communications without the usual headaches of replacing entire systems.
Operating on a flexible subscription model, the cloud system departs from the traditional upfront investment in infrastructure. It enables the hospital to scale services as needed, with built-in redundancies to ensure continuous operations.
Running on TELUS’ secure network, it offers high availability and essential backup for critical healthcare communications and sensitive data management.
Heather Tulk, president, commercial
and public sector at TELUS, a key figure in the project, highlighted the significance of the successful launch: “This marks a monumental step in Canada’s healthcare digital transformation. By enhancing communication and collaboration, we’re ensuring that healthcare
This high-tech solution frees the hospital from the complexities of infrastructure management.
providers can deliver even better care to patients – securely and efficiently.”
Brian Silverstone, president and general manager of Avaya Canada, commented on the broader implications of the partnership: “TELUS has been at the forefront of digital transformation, consistently demonstrating an ability to de-
liver mission-critical communication solutions to enterprises across Canada. Their deep expertise in cloud and AI technologies, combined with their extensive knowledge of the Canadian market, makes them an ideal partner for Avaya as we continue to expand our cloud offerings.”
This technological leap forward is setting a new standard for healthcare communications, offering a practical roadmap for other institutions looking to modernize their own systems.
As Canada’s healthcare sector watches closely, this success story proves that digital transformation is not just possible – it’s essential. By combining innovative technology with cost-effective strategies, North York General has demonstrated that modernizing communication infrastructure can enhance patient care without sacrificing operational efficiency.
Progress in CT, mammography and AI announced at RSNA conference
Every November, thousands of radiologists, radiology managers, vendors and allied professionals gather for the world’s largest medical meeting – the Radiological Society of North America (RSNA) conference, held annually in Chicago. It also includes a huge trade show – here are some of the noteworthy announcements from the latest summit, held at the end of last year.
Siemens
Three years after the launch of the world’s first commercially available photoncounting CT scanner, the Naeotom Alpha, Siemens Healthineers introduced two more members of this line – a second dual source scanner, called the Naeotom Alpha.Pro, as well as the world’s first single source scanner with photon-counting technology, the Naeotom Alpha.Prime.
Since 2021, more than a million patients have already been scanned worldwide on the Naeotom Alpha. It will remain part of a new class of photon-counting CT scanners and will be known as Naeotom Alpha.Peak.
Photon-counting CT enables the acquisition of more detailed images with anatomical and functional information by “counting” each individual X-ray photon that passes through patients. Siemens Healthineers is currently investing US$86 million to expand photoncounting detector production in Forchheim, Germany.
Naeotom Alpha.Peak will be the highend model of the new product series with the fast scan time of 737 mm/sec (millimeters per second), making it the preferred system for radiologists who continue to demand high clinical performance.
All Naeotom Alpha class systems will use the Quantum HD resolution feature to display anatomical details in high resolution at a slice thickness of 0.2 mm. Without increasing the radiation dose, small abnormalities become visible.
Naeotom Alpha.Pro combines the precision of photon-counting with the speed of dual source CT, resulting in scan times as fast as 491 mm/sec. Demanding examinations can be performed for example in pulmonology, with patients needing to hold their breath for less time; in cardiology, with scans at high heart rates without beta-blockers; and in pediatrics, where children can be scanned without sedation.
Naeotom Alpha.Prime is the world’s first single source photon-counting CT for use as a high-performance scanner for inpatient, ambulatory, and emergency room examinations in stand-alone institutions and big IDNs (Integrated Delivery Networks), or also in the periphery of huband-spoke networks.
Redesigned mammography: Siemens showed the Mammomat B.brilliant – the first completely redesigned Siemens Healthineers mammography platform in over a decade. It includes new 3D image acquisition and image reconstruction technology, adding to the system’s already cleared features for full-field digital mammography or two-dimensional breast imaging; breast biopsy; and titanium contrast-enhanced mammography. Other fea-
tures improve patient comfort, enhance user workflow, and improve ergonomics compared to its predecessor system, the Mammomat Revelation.
The hallmark of all Siemens Healthineers 3D mammography platforms is its 50-degree wide-angle technology – the widest angle available, according to the company. This technology overcomes the issue of overlapping breast tissue that is a challenge with 2D imaging, regardless of breast density. It separates overlapping layers of breast tissue to help visualize lesions that would otherwise be obscured by pro-
ergonomic feature enables the technologist to move the tube head independently of the image receptor, allowing for easy patient access during positioning. A laser guide permits accurate breast positioning. Together, these features can improve workflow.
An ergonomic hand grip and optimized, stationary face shield allow the patient to lean into the system during image acquisition for greater stability and the visualization of more posterior breast tissue. These features combine with a redesigned ambient light display, intelligent
• No wait time between exposures, allowing technologists to operate at their own speed. Pristina Via DBT image-to-image cycle time is up to twice as fast as other mammography systems on the market, the company said.
• Vendor-neutral prior image comparison, reducing time spent analyzing previous exams and enabling final assessments more efficiently.
• Lowest radiation dose used for all breast thicknesses amongst major mammography systems.
Additionally, Pristina Via also features a
viding up to 3.5 times the depth resolution (or tissue separation) of some other mammography systems.
The Mammomat B.brilliant builds on this wide-angle approach with PlatinumTomo, a new 3D technology that enables a 50-degree acquisition in less than five seconds. PlatinumTomo reduces the blur inherent in 3D imaging and potentially assists the radiologist in making a more confident diagnosis.
These benefits are possible due to the system’s fast detector and its new X-ray tube, which uses flying focal spot technology adapted for breast imaging from
Photon counting CTs from Siemens have already been used on more than a million patients around the world.
Siemens Healthineers computed tomography scanners. Additionally, new UltraHD image reconstruction technology reduces metal artifacts, leverages for crisp visualization of calcifications, and offers customizable image settings. The system also provides a synthetic 2D image with no additional radiation exposure to the patient, reducing the radiologist’s need for fullfield digital mammography images.
Several previously cleared features benefit the radiologic technologist. A prominent display monitor allows the technologist to clearly see patient information and work steps. The automated ComfortMove
personalized breast compression, and rounded breast compression paddles to reduce patient discomfort, improve breast positioning, and enable more consistent image quality.
GE HealthCare
GE HealthCare announced the new Pristina Via mammography system, designed to enhance the screening experience for both technologists and patients. This innovation provides mammography technologists with a suite of sophisticated tools that balance the demands of diagnostic accuracy and fast-paced workflows to facilitate more patient-centered breast care.
Recent data from the American Society of Radiologic Technologists (ASRT) highlights a dramatic increase in technologist vacancy rates – from 6 percent three years ago to 18 percent in 2024 – while the number of women seeking mammograms has remained steady. Amid this global shortage of technologists, the demand for more efficient and intelligent workflows is at an all-time high.
Pristina Via brings advanced new features to help minimize repetitive tasks and streamline workflows so that mammography technologists can maintain their focus on providing quality and personalized care during the screening experience.
The Pristina Via mammography system takes in-room workflow and patient comfort to the next level through:
• Zero-click acquisition functionality for faster, seamless workflows.
future-focused, scalable platform with full backward compatibility to provide imaging centers access to the latest capabilities while also providing flexibility to support the evolving needs of their sites. Pristina Via is built on the Pristina platform which provides exceptional reliability. The Pristina platform is supported by GE HealthCare service contracts and warranty, under which the Pristina systems demonstrate a 99 percent uptime.
Deep Learning innovations in MRI: GE HealthCare unveiled Sonic DL for 3D, the newest addition to its effortless imaging portfolio, designed to accelerate MRI scans across a wide range of clinical applications. Sonic DL for 3D builds on GE HealthCare’s deep learning innovation legacy and the success of AIR Recon DL, which has helped over 34 million patients to date.
Initially launched in 2023 for Cardiac MRI, Sonic DL provides up to 12 times scan acceleration while maintaining diagnostic quality. Now, GE HealthCare is extending Sonic DL to 3D volumetric imaging, designing it to broaden its applicability to brain, spine, orthopedic and body exams, in addition to cardiac. This expansion is intended to retain the same impressive 12x acceleration and reduce scan times by up to 86 percent.
Healthcare burnout has reached critical levels, with 63 percent of physicians and 49 percent of nurses reporting symptoms of burnout, according to a 2023 American Medical Association (AMA) survey. Rising workloads, time constraints, and staffing shortages contribute
to high stress and fatigue among healthcare professionals, directly impacting patient care.
Addressing these challenges, Sonic DL for 3D is designed to help enable faster, high-quality imaging for a majority of MR exams. By combining Sonic DL’s speed with AIR Recon DL’s noise reduction technology, this deep learning integration is intended to empower clinicians to significantly cut scan times, enhance image resolution by up to 55 percent, and enable faster, more accurate diagnoses with greater ease.
In neurology, Sonic DL 3D is designed to enable high-resolution imaging of complex brain structures, allowing for quicker, clearer insights into neurological conditions. In orthopedics, it will help to speed up the imaging of joints, ligaments, and bones, reducing scan times to minimize patient discomfort, especially for those with mobility challenges. By advancing speed and clarity in these critical areas, Sonic DL 3D helps to enhance clinical workflows, improve patient comfort, and support timely diagnoses.
Canon
Medical Systems
Following the launch of two new CT systems (Aquilion ONE / INSIGHT Edition, Aquilion Serve SP) at the 2023 RSNA annual congress, Canon Medical featured enhanced CT technologies for Super Resolution and ultra-low-dose imaging. It was announced that the Aquilion ONE / INSIGHT Edition has been awarded the 2024 Best New Radiology Device at the annual Minnies Awards, which celebrate excellence and innovation in radiology.
Canon’s unique approach of using Deep Learning Reconstruction (DLR) technologies redefines how high resolution and low dose images can be enhanced using conventional CT. The capabilities of Precise IQ Engine (PIQE) and SilverBeam Filter technologies have been expanded since their shared introduction to allow a wider variety of use and provide even better delineation of anatomical and pathological structures.
Powered by Altivity (Canon Medical’s AI brand), Precise IQ Engine leverages DLR technology to maximize the scanner’s inherent resolution to reconstruct 1024 matrix CT with excellent low-contrast detectability and no additional dose. Initially launched with a cardiac focus, Super Resolution PIQE 1024 is now available for cardiac, body, and lung (PIQE 1024 is pending Health Canada approval).
SilverBeam Filter: SilverBeam, an X-ray beam shaping energy filter, leverages the photon-attenuating properties of silver to selectively remove low energy photons from a polychromatic X-ray beam, creating an optimized energy spectrum for lung cancer screening. When combined with our Advanced intelligent Clear-IQ Engine (AiCE) Deep Learning Reconstruction technology, SilverBeam delivers the sharpness and clarity required for confident lung imaging at ultra-low dose. Canon Medical is now expanding SilverBeam across applications such as MSK, including cervical spine scans.
MRI: In MRI, Canon gave Vantage Galan 3T / Supreme Edition its RSNA debut. Introduced globally in April, this newest release features all components that have been manufactured by Canon.
Galan 3T / Supreme Edition’s real-time platform includes the company’s own magnet design, which delivers an expanded field of view compared with the previous magnet used in Canon MRI scanners.
Canon has also incorporated its Altivity suite of AI algorithms – including its Advanced intelligent Clear-IQ Engine (AiCE) and Precise IQ Engine (PIQE) for optimizing image quality and decreasing scan times.
Photon-Counting CT: Canon Medical Systems Corporation announced that it has launched a research collaboration with Penn Medicine for the application of photon-counting CT after completing the installation of the world’s 4th Canon-developed system for photon-counting CT technology at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. Research is underway aimed at accelerating the development of PCCT by continuing the advancement of diagnostic devices based on feedback from clinical practice. The partnership will focus on enhancing specific diagnostic imaging specialties such as chest/cardiac and musculoskeletal imaging.
Barco
RSNA visitors were able to see Barco’s Coronis OneLook, a high-resolution monitor that was launched on October 1st. Barco’s newest flagship monitor offers a 32 megapixel display, said to be the highest resolution in breast imaging monitors today. Coronis OneLook features advanced technology that enhances visualization, ensuring that radiologists can detect even the smallest anomalies with precision, the company said.
Kingston ICU among first to use portable MRI
as valuable for the transport of ICU patients at Kingston General.
“Sometimes it’s as difficult to move patients the 500 metres from the ICU to the radiology department as it is to get them here from Moose Factory,” he said.
That’s because the frail neuro patients outfitted with catheters, IV lines and wires are very difficult to move from one room to another. Moreover, it’s a challenge to round up the human resources needed for transport at a time of staff shortages.
By imaging patients in the ICU, the hospital will also free up resources in the radiology department, meaning that other patients can obtain exams on conventional MRIs. In turn, wait lists for outpatients requiring cancer imaging can be reduced.
Dr. Islam estimates the hospital will be able to provide MRI exams to 648 more cancer patients – a current focus of care – each year.
And the sooner the cancer patients can be scanned, the sooner their issues can be addressed, leading to better care and hopefully, improved outcomes.
Noting the 90 minutes that it takes to prepare and image an ICU
Niagara hospital
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 6
Acting like a personal tablet, the IBT will allow patients to control room elements such as lighting and temperature, contact the nurse call system, and watch TV.
Visitors to the mock-up space immediately notice the large windows in the patient bedrooms, purposefully incorporated to give patients and visitors in the 12-storey building impressive views of the outdoors, and better access to natural daylight. The windows on the building are an example of another exciting technology, and one that is helping the hospital work towards achieving LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) Silver Certification.
The building atrium will be equipped with electrochromic glass on large spans of exterior lobby windows, using servers and software to dictate when and how the glass should tint.
Through a combination of predictive and real-time inputs such as weather, location and cloud cover, the software manages the amount of daylight and glare while acting to conserve energy throughout the day.
One of the most innovative and exciting features of the SNH is that it is on-track to be the first WELL Certified hospital in Canada. Recognized
patient in the MRI suite, Dr. Islam said the human resource benefits of being able to scan patients at bedside in the ICU cannot be underestimated.
As well, a nurse, respiratory therapist, and a porter are needed to accompany the patients to the imaging suite – at a time when there is a shortage of these healthcare professionals.
Acquiring the $600,000 Swoop, he said, is a cost-effective way of improving neurological and cancer care. Just by imaging 20 neurological patients each month in the ICU,
By imaging patients in the ICU, KHSC estimates it can reduce MRI waits in the radiology suites.
which is the current estimate, KHSC expects to save 1728 hours of staff time annually while creating capacity to scan 648 more cancer patients in the radiology department each year.
“It’s a no-brainer, pardon the pun,” quipped Dr. Islam. “Or should I say, it’s a nothing but brainer?”
He commented that the purchase of the Swoop is being made possible
worldwide throughout the architectural industry, the WELL Certification program is a scientifically developed and independently verified tool to help design buildings and measure their impact on the health and wellbeing of the occupants.
Organized around 10 concepts of building performance –Air, Water, Nourishment, Light, Movement, Thermal Comfort, Sound, Materials, Mind and Community – WELL is a program that details design and operational guidelines specifically focused on improving health and
The new South Niagara Hospital is on track to become Canada’s first WELL certified hospital.
wellness outcomes for the people using the building.
The project recently achieved WELL Precertification, a significant milestone acknowledging that the design prioritizes the wellness of all building users.
WELL features such as access to natural imagery and daylight, improved air and water quality, and more nutritional food offerings are all features of the SNH that will help improve the patient and caregiver experience, while also providing a healthier workplace for staff and physicians. All of these features will be fully sup-
in Kingston, just as it was in Moose Factory, by a financial contribution from a generous donor. The centre was scheduled to have a ceremony marking the launch of the machine at the end of January.
Dr. Islam noted the Hyperfine Swoop is an ultra low-field MRI, with a field strength of 64 milliTesla, not much more than a fridge magnet. That compares with the 1.5T and 3T field strength of the magnets used in conventional MRIs. It uses the same power supply as a coffee machine.
He said the Swoop doesn’t replace a conventional MRI by any means, but it provides images that allow radiologists to determine if a patient does indeed have a stroke. It also enables them to check the position of shunts and catheters to assist in surgical planning and to assess brain bleeds.
“It’s almost like a different modality,” said Dr. Islam. “It’s not a traditional MRI image, or a CT or ultrasound. It’s something different. But it’s exquisitely sensitive to assessing strokes, brain swelling, the size of bleeds, and the location of shunts and catheters. That’s all we need to make an accurate and timely diagnosis and proceed with treatment.”
ported by building technologies.
As Niagara Health plans for a hospital that will be operational for the next hundred years, naturally there was a need to incorporate some robots into the operational planning.
To improve workplace efficiencies, the SNH will use an Automated Transport System (ATS) to help move supplies and materials in an efficient and autonomous way. Automated Guided Vehicles will help transport goods such as linen or food carts from floor to floor, moving along designated elevators and paths.
They will notify staff when they arrive at their destination, who will then unload and distribute the deliveries. Autonomous Mobile Robots (AMRs) will also offer significant improvements in operations. Secured robots will deliver specimens to the lab, and transport medications from pharmacies to medication rooms where they will be met and unlocked by staff with secure access.
More than 500 staff, physicians, patients and community partners have toured the mockup spaces, catching an exciting glimpse at the future SNH and providing feedback that has helped shape the final hospital design.
Antonietta Culic is a Senior Communications Specialist with the South Niagara Hospital Project.
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