Digital Pathology Blog

In nearly every conversation we have with major hospital centers and pathology labs, the question comes up about how to initiate 2^nd opinion pathology referrals from outside the US. Everybody wants to know: how can we work with China…or India…or other areas of the world where pathology is dramatically underserved? Most US expert centers have a healthy referral business, with slides arriving via mail and FedEx daily/weekly. Going digital in pathology would provide the means to increase referral business by streamlining and accelerating the process, from image acquisition to diagnostic report. 

The Affordable Care Act and market changes like baby boomers entering their senior years with a decreasing amount of doctors to care for them are driving a mind-blowing rate of change in healthcare. Medical practices, including pathology, will sink or swim based on how they adapt to the new realities.

It’s interesting to look beyond the U.S. to see how global digital pathology adoption is progressing. After a three month test pilot last year (with more testing over the next ten months), University Hospitals Coventry and Warwickshire NHS Trust has launched a digital pathology system across its facility with the Omnyx Integrated Digital pathology system from GE Healthcare.

Pathologists, particularly forensic pathologists and medical examiners, seem to provoke endless curiosity from Hollywood television writers. The pathology fascination can be seen in shows throughout the years like Quincy ME, Body of Proof, Rizzoli and Isles, and the CSI shows:

When you boil it down to the bones, digital pathology needs to do one thing: make life easier for pathologists. Their role involves supporting physicians and patients across many institutions, geographies and hardware. They need to integrate all they do with their LISs. The end result has to be a better, faster, smarter, and easier to use workflow environment.

Major changes rarely evolve in a linear fashion. It usually comes down to a group of people pushing forward a new model while another group holds on with both hands to the status quo. Then a small group in the middle plays its role as the bridge to both sides.

Maybe not much, but it got us thinking. There has been some buzz lately about medical tourism funneling revenues away from US hospitals to overseas providers that offer popular procedures at lower cost.

The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) estimates that up to 750,000 US residents travel abroad to get care each year, while other sources put the number at closer to a million. The most common procedures sought by US residents in other countries include cosmetic surgery, dentistry, and heart surgery. The impetus for this mini-exodus is the hunt for cheaper medical procedures. 

Keith J. Kaplan, MD

                        Carolinas Healthcare System

Charlotte, NC

Imagine, if you will, a left-handed bicycle tire, a right-handed fork or a tumor board without, well, pathology images of the tumor.

Tumor boards are a multi-disciplinary conference where patients (cases) are presented – their clinical history, radiology findings, and pathology findings (whether biopsy or resection material) – are presented to clinicians for discussions on treatment, management, and best patient care.

Richard Wingard

CEO, Euclid Discoveries

Co-founder, Corista

30 years ago, as the University of Kansas implemented the first PACS system, 60% of Radiologists vowed they’d never read anything but film on a white box. Most radiologists predicted a stunning collapse for the new-fangled digital radiology, certain it’d never get off the ground.

Welcome to the Corista blog. We look forward to this forum for sharing news, stories and experiences in how physicians are using digital pathology. Our goal is a broad conversation on the support of physicians and scientists as they increasingly use digital pathology in clinical and research environments.