Patients

Some of the patients who have benefited from PACS share their experiences:

• Peter Short - the GP from Buxton broke his leg whilst skiing in France. Returning home to England with his hard copy x-rays from a French hospital, Peter went for treatment at his local hospital where - with digital imaging in place - he was impressed at the contrast in his treatment.
• Olivier Jenkins - IT analyst Olivier broke his collar bone whilst snowboarding on his birthday and was cared for at Leeds General Infirmary. The use of PACS meant that Olivier could gain an excellent understanding of his condition and treatment.
• Andrew Harvie - the estate agent from London was mugged and had his jaw broken in several places. Thanks to PACS, Andrew was treated relatively quickly during the busy Christmas period.

Healthcare professionals

Healthcare professionals talk about how PACS has helped transform the delivery of patient care within their hospital trusts:

• Andrew Fearn is Director of Health Informatics at Nottingham University Hospitals NHS Trust. He says the implementation of PACS has delivered more efficient ways of working, cost savings and improved patient care and safety. “We have met and exceeded all our expectations,” he says.
• Deborah Cunningham, Clinical Director of Radiology at St Mary’s hospital (part of Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust) says the working practices of clinicians have changed dramatically for the better since the introduction of PACS. Multidisciplinary team meetings (MDTs) are one example. Deborah says: “During our MDTs everyone can access the images at the same time, regardless of where they are located in the trust.”
• Peter Birch and his colleagues at Gateshead Health NHS Foundation Trust are great fans of PACS. He says: “Looking at the previous manual systems and the limitations of using traditional wet films, the great opportunities that PACS presented were obvious and the trust was very keen to make the most of the IT available. For Gateshead, the benefits of PACS speak for themselves.”

Video testimonials

NHS Connecting for Health talked to staff from a number of hospital trusts to find out how PACS has been making a difference to patient care.

The video clips below demonstrate how the system has been benefiting patients and trusts, what healthcare staff find most exciting about PACS and what they hope to gain from it in the future:

• Clinicians describe how they are benefiting from PACS
• What are the benefits of PACS for patients?
• How can a trust benefit from using PACS?
• What do you find most exciting about PACS?

Tell us what you think

Have you a story to tell about PACS? Email us at pacs.query@nhs.net