Pro Medicus signs $140m US deal for Visage 7 cloud-based diagnostic imaging platform

Healthcare informatics company Pro Medicus (ASX: PME) has signed a $140 million contract for the supply of its Visage 7 cloud-based diagnostic imaging platform to US not-for-profit organisation Baylor Scott & White Health.

The 10-year contract was secured through Pro Medicus wholly-owned US subsidiary Visage Imaging Inc and will replace multiple legacy PACS (picture archiving and communications systems) archives throughout Baylor Scott’s network.

Under the terms of the deal, Visage Imaging will implement the Visage 7 platform (including Open Archive and Workflow modules) and provide enterprise-wide distribution of images integrated with the company’s electronic health records.

The rollout will be based on Visage’s cloud-based implementation process, with multi-phased “go-lives” targeted to begin in the new year.

Cloud-engineered trend

Pro Medicus chief executive officer Dr Sam Hupert said Baylor Scott was the latest client to opt for a fully cloud-engineered solution — a trend which has become the standard in the North American healthcare technology market.

“Baylor Scott joins our impressive list of Tier 1 clients and represents our first major client win in Texas,” he said.

“This contract is for our “full-stack” comprising viewer, workflow and archive products… the scale and scope of this initiative will see nearly 500 radiologists exposed to the benefits of Visage 7.”

Cloud-based systems

Dr Hupert said the move to cloud-based systems and implementations had benefited the company’s new contracts.

“We are increasing the speed at which we can implement and the cloud has certainly been a factor… it provides a more standardised environment minus a hardware purchasing cycle which previously could take between six and nine months,” he said.

“With the cloud, we can spin up a version of Visage in a matter of days [and] we are continually refining our implementation and training processes using a hybrid of onsite and remote implementations.”

He said cloud-based diagnostics systems were the way of the future.

“It is the way the industry is moving and we are the leaders in that transition, being the only vendor capable of a truly full-cloud implementation so it is of enormous strategic value to us.”