AES Medical has begun development of the enhanced optional imaing add-on for PathoSys®. This adds image editing and reporting to the functionality provided by the standard PathoSys® imaging add-on already available.

While histological diagnosis may be influenced by various data, it is ultimately based upon the appearance of the specimens being examined macroscopically and microscopically.

With the new add-on this information can be communicated from cancer pathology reports created by the PathoSys® system.

Features

• Creation of new images.
• Editing of macro (taken at cut up) & micro images (captured from scanning of slides & microscopes).
• Textual annotation of images.
• Insertion of images into pathology reports*.
  *where this is supported by the host Laboratory Information System (LIMS)

Imaging add-on advantages

• Immediate availability of macro and micro images related to the case under examination.
• Image files available to all pathologists and PathoSys® users.
• The images provide a visual addition to the standard descriptions.
• MDT meetings are supported by the ability to print a report containing the images associated with the pathology report.

Existing customers and any parties interesting in PathoSys® or anatomical pathology imaging are invited to contact AES Medical for more information.

AES Medical has begun working with one of our main clients to provide a direct export of cancer data to the Trent and North Yorkshire (NYCRIS) Cancer Registries.

How it will work:

Using an exact export criteria, the data is extracted from the PathoSys database and will be sent directly to the Cancer Registries, doing away with the need for the Trusts to manually search and send information and for the Registries to trawl through large numbers of text reports.

Project expectations:

We hope this project will provide AES Medical with the chance to demonstrate the unique advantages available to cancer registries when receiving data from pathology laboratories that have PathoSys® installed:

• Structured data export, which removes the requirement for manual interpretation of pathology reports or inaccurate text analysis technology.
• All data fields that make up the Royal College of Pathologists datasets can be selected by the user and then exported in a format and order specified by the user.
• Potentially costly interfacing to the laboratory system, which often delivers limited data in differing formats, is no longer required.
• As PathoSys® is laboratory system independent regular exports in a single format defined by the cancer registry can be sent from multiple laboratories with differing laboratory systems.
• Upgrading and replacing of the laboratory system will not interrupt the regular flow of data to the cancer registry.
• We are planning in addition to exhibiting PathoSys® to present this project the UKACR in October with the two Cancer Registries.

AES Medical will be exhibiting our PathoSys® Cancer Reporting and Information Management system at the Royal Society of Medicine

AES Ltd is pleased to announce our continuing accreditation under the International Standards Organisation standard 9001:2000.

AES Ltd has been accredited for over 10 Years. Initially under ISO 9001:1994 (between 1996 and 2004) and then under the replacement ISO 9001:2000 standard.

The new ISO 9001:2000 standard was first published in December 2000 and finally replaced the previous version in December 2003.

ISO 9001:2000 is the world’s most successful standard addressing best practice in the application of quality management systems.

ISO 9001:2000 has achieved global recognition, particularly amongst organisations who have demonstrated their capability to meet stringent customer expectations through quality assurance.

Following expressions of customer interest, AES Medical has begun analysis work on several additional datasets for the PathoSys® system. Completion of these will provide full coverage of the currently released Royal College of Pathologists standards and datasets for reporting cancers.

The datasets undergoing analysis are:

• Dataset for the histopathological reporting of tumours of the central nervous system (2004)
• Endocrine dataset (2006) which comprises of:
• Dataset for reporting adrenal cortical carcinoma and malignant phaeochromocytoma/paraganglioma
• Dataset for parathyroid cancer histopathology reports
• Dataset for thyroid cancer histopathology reports
• Dataset for the histopathological reporting of ovarian tumours, and Fallopian tube and primary peritoneal carcinomas (2005)
• Dataset for the histopathological reporting of lymphoma (2002)
• Dataset for penile cancer histopathology reports (2006)

Any PathoSys® users or other interested parties seeking further information or wishing to contribute to the analysis and design process are invited to contact us by the online feedback form or through the user group.

In addition to this analysis work AES Medical continues to provide customers with updates containing the latest versions of the Royal College of Pathologists datasets and functional enhancements to the PathoSys® system.

The PathoSys® usergroup is now online. Please visit to register and for more information.

PathoSys® provides pathology cancer reporting and information management.The PathoSys® usergroup is dedicated to informing and educating PathoSys® users about AES Medical products, services and any recent developments. 

The user group aims to enable its members to:

• Share experiences in using the PathoSys® product and associated services with other user group members and learn from their experiences.
• Influence direction and improve PathoSys® through communication and cooperation with AES Medical.
• Provide an online forum for sharing knowledge and news from all sources with other AES Medical user group members. The forum includes discussion sections for: 
  • Histopathology
  • Cancer datasets
  • Staging and grading

AES Medical has updated its PathoSys® cancer reporting software to include the Royal College of Pathologists amended Gastric and Oesophageal Cancer Datasets. 

AES Medical is obliged through its licence agreement with the Royal College of Pathologists to keep PathoSys® up to date with latest Cancer Datasets. This rapid turnaround for the new 

datasets demonstrates our commitment to this process and our capacity to keep pace with the changes introduced by the Royal College of Pathologists.

Gastric

The new amended dataset published in January 2007 supersedes the 1st edition published in 2000. The new dataset is coordinated by Professor Marco R Novelli and is due for review in January 2009. 

Oesophageal

The new amended dataset published in February 2007 supersedes the 1st edition published in 1998. The new dataset is coordinated by Dr Nicholas P Mapstone and is due for review in February 2010. 

The new Gastic and Oesophageal Datasets along with all others published by the Royal College of Pathologists are available for download on the Royal College of Pathologists website.

The PathoSys® imaging add-on is now available. The add-on allows high-quality images in JPG, GIF TIFF, or BMP format to be easily associated with pathology reports for presentation to colleagues, surgeons or Multi-Disciplinary Team (MDT) meetings.

While histological diagnosis may be influenced by various data, it is ultimately based upon the appearance of the specimens being examined macroscopically and microscopically. This information can now be associated with pathology reports in the PathoSys® system. 

The imaging module provides the following main features:

• Association of imaging with PathoSys® pathology reports.
• View, zoom and export images.
• Printing of images as a report to both local and network printers.

Advantages of the Imaging add-on

• Immediate availability of macro and micro images related to the case under examination.

• Image files available to all pathologists and PathoSys® users.

• The images provide a visual addition to the standard descriptions.

• MDT meetings are supported by the ability to print a report containing the images associated with the pathology report.

PathoSys® users will have the option to upgrade the imaging add-on to an enhanced version offering image creation, editing and manipulation. In addition PathoSys® will allow the insertion of images into pathology reports where this is supported by the host Laboratory Information System (LIMS) .

AES Medical has successfully applied to NHS Connecting for Health for licences to provide its NHS customers with ICD-10 and OPCS-4 coding. This will enable AES Medical to continue its support for the key criteria set out in the NHS Plan to improve the flow and use of information within the NHS.

The agreement also enables PathoSys® to provide export of high quality data for The National Clinical Audit Support Programme (NCASP). This includes the following national audits:

• National Bowel Cancer Audit Project (NBOCAP)
• Head and Neck Cancer Audit (DAHNO)
• National Oesophago-gastric Cancer Audit
• National Mastectomy and Breast Reconstruction Audit

ICD-10

The ICD-10 (International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems – Tenth Revision) classification is used for the recording of diseases and health related problems ie the diagnosis or reason for a patient episode of health care. The World Health Organisation (WHO) produces the classification and ICD-10 is the latest version.

ICD-10 is used within the acute sector of the NHS and the classification codes are mandatory for use across England.

The ICD-10 codes are WHO copyright, however, NHS Connecting for Health holds the licence for the UK to use the ICD-10 codes within the NHS as the joint UK World Health Organisation Collaborating Centre for the Classification of Diseases.

OPCS-4

The Office of Population Censuses and Surveys Classification of Surgical Operations and Procedures – Fourth Revision (OPCS-4) is a statistical classification devised for translating or classifying all operations and surgical procedures that may be carried out on a patient during an episode of health care in the NHS acute sector.

OPCS-4 is Crown copyright. The NHS Connecting for Health holds responsibility for the administration and maintenance of OPCS-4 and issuing of licence agreements.

PathoSys® supports the use of Dragon Naturally Speaking (from Nuance) for free text data entry. This combined with PathoSys® enables pathologists to eliminate high costs, relieve staffing pressures and reduce the long turnaround times associated with manual transcription of patient notes, whilst minimising the risk of repetitive stress injuries.

In addition to supporting the PathoSys® Cancer Reporting and Information Management system, Dragon Naturally speaking can be used with any Microsoft Office application or any Windows based solution.

If you wish to see this functionality please specify this when booking your presentation with the AES Medical sales team.

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