The briefing was highlighted in issue 225 of 'The Week', the Department of Health's weekly bulletin for NHS chief executives and their teams.

Chief executives were asked to assure themselves that plans are in place within their trusts to address the end of the (LSP) contracts for picture archiving and communication systems (PACS) and related services, that progress is being made to ensure service continuity and to provide timely approval of plans and business cases.

PACS are critical to the operation of trust radiology services and all hospital departments where x-rays and scans are accessed.

LSP contracts for PACS, radiology information systems and image archiving will presently expire in 30 June 2013 for all parts of the country apart from London, where the contract ends in June 2014.

Extensions to these contracts are available under the contract terms and are currently being negotiated. There is potential, with Government agreement, for trusts to extend their contracts to June 2016 at the latest.