Softek Illuminate News

Softek Solutions Inc., exhibiting in booth 2648 at RSNA 2011, has signed an agreement with five Kaiser Permanente Northern California hospitals for radiologists and clinicians to use Softek Illuminate.

Illuminate’s free–text search, notification and analytics technology gives users split–second access to the wealth of unstructured data locked in their system, along with the business intelligence needed to make faster, more informed clinical and business decisions.

Illuminate is now in use at Kaiser Permanente San Francisco, Roseville, Sacramento, Walnut Creek and South Sacramento medical centers. The Permanente Medical Group, formed more than 60 years ago, is the largest managed care organization in the United States. Kaiser’s EMR system, HealthConnect, is the largest private–sector EMR in the world, and its integrated healthcare delivery model includes more than 7,000 physicians practicing at 36 hospitals. Twenty–four Kaiser hospitals, including all Illuminate sites, have received the highest award (the Stage 7 Award) from HIMSS Analytics for their level of EMR implementation.

“Kaiser is on the forefront of healthcare IT development, and we are confident that Illuminate’s integration into their radiologists’ workflow will lead to better patient care,” said Softek CEO Matt McLenon.

Illuminate’s proprietary free–text search capability lets users search across multiple data sources and retrieve, at a minimum, radiology, pathology and laboratory reports in a matter of seconds. Users can search widely by diagnosis or condition, or they can narrow a search to a desired demographic or specific person. A patent–pending algorithm ensures that the most relevant results are listed first. Illuminate Analytics^™, powered by this search capability, accesses the electronic medical data and turns it into actionable business intelligence. Illuminate ActKnowledge^™ facilitates the communication and documentation of critical, urgent and incidental findings.

Softek Illuminate^® has signed its first two international clients, the Regional University Hospital (CHRU) of Lille, France, and St. Vincent’s Hospital in Sydney, Australia. The agreements, made through Philips Global Sales and Service, call for Illuminate to be installed on the hospitals’ Philips iSite PACS and will give radiologists instant access to the wealth of unstructured data locked in their system.

“Illuminate gives radiologists and administrators a full picture of their patients and practice — from individual patient history and follow–up to current trends in demographics, ordering, diseases and quality issues,” said Matt McLenon, CEO of Softek Solutions Inc., which manufactures Illuminate. “We are excited to bring this technology to two hospitals across the world from each other that are dedicated to improving patient care and business practices in a measurable way.”

Illuminate was deployed at St. Vincent’s in early September and is scheduled to begin at CHRU in early November.

CHRU is the only teaching hospital in the Nord–pas–de–Calais region of Northern France and is part of the largest hospital system in Western Europe, with nearly 4,000 physicians on staff. CHRU is a leader in both patient care and technology innovation. Care specialties include cancer treatment and research, pediatrics, cardiology and trauma. Both medical and technology students work with researchers in the healthcare engineering/IT lab to develop healthcare IT solutions.

St. Vincent’s, founded more than 150 years ago by the Sisters of Charity, is one of the largest not–for–profit healthcare providers in Australia. The academic hospital just outside Sydney’s central business district is a recognized trauma center and known for its cardiology, pulmonary, cancer and HIV/AIDS treatment specialties, among others. It was the first hospital in Australia to perform a successful heart transplant and to treat patients with HIV/AIDS.

Illuminate’s proprietary free–text search capability lets users retrieve radiology reports and images in a matter of seconds. Users can search widely by diagnosis or condition, or they can use advanced criteria to narrow a search to a desired demographic or specific person. A patent–pending algorithm ensures that the most relevant results are listed first. Illuminate Analytics, powered by this search capability, accesses the electronic medical data and turns it into actionable business intelligence.