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ric expands reach of around-the-clock services an inteleone case study nch healthcare system in naples florida chooses intelerad to provide their next generation pacs solution to address seasonal volume increases from snowbirds that flock to the region each fall adoption of inteleone facilitates premium service level for about nch healthcare system all clients radiology imaging consultants sc ric is a large radiology practice with a long history of providing patient focused care in the chicago area what began as a single-hospital over 35 years ago is now a leading provider of radiology services with 75 radiologists delivering an unprecedented level of customer service and clinical expertise to 19 clinics and hospitals today ric reads over 850,000 studies per year throughout illinois indiana and kentucky trend-setting move to round-the-clock reads in the early 1990s when still a single-hospital practice ric had the foresight and vision to differentiate the practice by providing final interpretations around the clock in a move that would establish ric as a trend-setter the group became the first private facility in the state of illinois to provide on-site final interpretations by a board-certified radiologist 24 hours a day every patient coming to an emergency department and every inpatient received a final interpretation of all imaging studies at the time of service years before the development of pacs this was a fortuitous move for ric as well as for the patients and physicians the group ultimately served prior to introducing 24-hour services ric radiologists could be greeted by a tall stack of cases waiting to be read on any given morning this potentially translated into delays of care or discharge often artificially extending a patient s length of stay this unfavorable scenario is still played out today in many healthcare facilities around the world 1 www.intelerad.com 1-888-246-9774 sales@intelerad.com © intelerad medical systems 2011 all rights reserved.

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leveraging the service model having differentiated the group as a provider of real time 24/7 radiology services ric began to consider leveraging the successful service model by expanding the practice in the early 1990s however candidates for expansion were limited to large healthcare facilities it simply wasn t feasible to provide around-the-clock on-site staffing for hospitals that did not meet a certain size threshold ric facility in advocate christ medical center by 2009 the maturation and proliferation of technology systems in the healthcare field had obviated the need to physically locate a radiologist on-site 24 hours a day in order to read studies for a given facility by enabling remote reading of studies these first generation technologies theoretically facilitated better use of all radiologists especially during slower evening and overnight hours however they also created new challenges today radiologists who read for multiple facilities must learn and become proficient with the wide variety of disparate radiology information systems ris hospital information systems his picture archiving and communication systems pacs and electronic medical records emr systems in use at healthcare facilities this severely limits radiologist productivity and creates it headaches and bottlenecks each time any practice adds a new facility these challenges are compounded in ric s case because technology barriers must not compromise the premium service level that sets ric apart access to information is key as a business ric has always maintained the same core values that originally prompted the successful 24-hour service model nearly twenty years ago dr abraham bronner is the ceo of ric and also a practicing radiologist with a 25-year history in this practice reflecting on this history bronner explains core to our values is providing the best final interpretations 24 hours a day for all examinations in a facility that we serve thus radiologists who work in our practice must have access no matter where they are to all the same information that a physician on-site at a specific hospital would have 2 www.intelerad.com 1-888-246-9774 sales@intelerad.com © intelerad medical systems 2011 all rights reserved.

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bronner and other ric executives are adamant that this premium level of care always be maintained it must not be compromised by the fact that a radiologist may be located off site or be reading studies for multiple facilities all information available to an on-site radiologist for example having all prior studies including plain films and other historical information must be available to a ric radiologist until very recently adhering to these principles limited the practice s opportunities for growth technology solution sought in 2009 ric leaders began to seek a technology solution that would allow for expansion while maintaining the core values of the company the business requirements were clear first the potential solution had to provide ric radiologists no matter where they were located access to all the critical information for any hospital or clinic the practice served including priors and technologists notes even when located in another facility it had to dr abraham bronner ceo and practicing radiologist be seamless to the radiologist so that they were in no way limited clinically by the fact that they were not on-site bronner explains secondly the solution had to be intuitive and easy to use it had to be efficient and user-friendly bronner continues we feel that radiologists should be able to serve multiple facilities and not even recognize the fact that they are working through different systems inteleone stands alone with a primary goal of identifying a technology solution that integrated these critical elements clinical depth as well as efficiency ric began to investigate the options offered by the market discouraged by the results of their initial search ric executives even began to consider and plan for the ambitious undertaking of creating their own in-house technology solution enter intelerad a leading provider of distributed radiology solutions which had just what the doctors ordered until inteleone there was nothing that convincingly integrated multiple facilities seamlessly bronner recalls no one else was able to do it the way ric needed 3 www.intelerad.com 1-888-246-9774 sales@intelerad.com © intelerad medical systems 2011 all rights reserved.

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intelerad s inteleone is a distributed radiology solution that allows radiology groups and hospitals to streamline their medical imaging workflows when reading for multiple facilities with different his ris pacs and emr it provides radiologists a personalized universal worklist and seamless access to all studies priors and reports from a single integrated viewer that can be accessed from any computer regardless of where the radiologist is located inteleone provides the complete picture inteleone fulfills ric s most critical requirement that radiologists have access to all relevant information including priors and other data which may be located at another facility in order to make a final interpretation this can now occur at any time of the day or night no matter where ric radiologists are physically located in relation to the facility for which they are reading furthermore inteleone can automatically locate priors in any of the systems that are connected freeing the radiologist from the need to locate request and assemble the complete ric reads over 850,000 studies per year for 19 clinics and hospitals history manually in addition patients in any facility that ric serves now have access to the best available specialist at any given time as a result patients get the best possible quality of care and turnaround time is minimized integrated worklist enables effective prioritization inteleone s integrated worklist is a huge benefit for ric it removes the radiologists need to constantly juggle disparate technology systems in use at the various healthcare facilities ric serves working from a single integrated worklist allows ric radiologists to plan and execute their work on the basis of importance among all cases needing attention rather than merely the subset of cases in the individual system they are currently using with the ability to prioritize the work based on specialization and clinical needs superior patient care is delivered the increased efficiency resulting from inteleone s integrated worklist also enables better leverage of the radiology staff prior to inteleone our basic philosophy was that one radiologist could not work for more than two facilities at any given time effectively bronner states now we have radiologists reading for five facilities concurrently but all through one universal interface 4 www.intelerad.com 1-888-246-9774 sales@intelerad.com © intelerad medical systems 2011 all rights reserved.

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new efficiency facilitates expansion into new markets expansion of the business continues at ric assisted and enhanced by the adoption of inteleone the business goal of introducing the 24-hour service offering to a new market in the form of smaller rural and remote healthcare facilities has been realized we could not approach that market in the past says bronner describing how the overhead involved in adding any new facility was not merited by the relatively modest increase in caseload for smaller hospitals and clinics in the past in order for us to deliver final interpretations 24hours a day it meant connecting our physicians to another facility learning to work on a new pacs and a concurrent ris another dictation system plus supporting a new organization from an it perspective it simply was not practical to add small facilities with the adoption of inteleone ric no longer has to weigh these tradeoffs with seamless access to all studies and related information from a single viewer the efficiency of all radiologists is maximized especially critical for evening and overnight resources as a result ric can now deliver the same level of service and care to small rural facilities that the practice has always delivered in large cities business vision realized superior service tradition continues one of ric s newest clients had been experiencing one to two day turnaround times on routine cases prior to contracting with ric now with us and inteleone their average turnaround time is 20 minutes bronner reports and their er turnaround time is about 12 to 17 minutes inteleone has enabled ric to streamline operations and greatly expand the reach of the practice realizing the business vision ric executives set out to achieve as a result the core service values on which ric was founded are continuing to benefit a growing number of patients in the region bronner sums up the central approach that sets his company apart our core service belief is that a patient coming into a facility at two o clock in the morning deserves the same high level of service as a patient who comes in at two o clock in the afternoon with inteleone ric can now reach an even greater number of patients and facilities with their comprehensive quality interpretations about intelerad medical systems for more resources visit www.intelerad.com/ric_pdf 5 www.intelerad.com 1-888-246-9774 sales@intelerad.com © intelerad medical systems 2011 all rights reserved.

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