May 23, 2019
Amsterdam, The Netherlands and Hammond, Ind. – Royal Philips (NYSE: PHG, AEX: PHIA), a global leader in health technology, and Alverno Laboratories, a provider of high-quality diagnostic testing services, today announced that Alverno will fully implement digital pathology in its clinical laboratories. The laboratory network will use Philips IntelliSite Pathology Solution to assess and diagnose all clinical histology cases digitally, instead of using a microscope, with the aim of improving laboratory efficiency, quality, and patient safety.
Pathology plays a critical role in disease detection, particularly with cancer diagnosis. Suspicious tissue samples are investigated to determine if the tissue is malignant and consequently guides treatment decisions. As one of the largest pathology laboratories in the Midwest, Alverno manages 33 hospital laboratories and provides laboratory services to two freestanding emergency departments and thousands of physician offices and other clients. Alverno consults on more than 142,000 histological cases each year, which translates to more than 1,100,000 slides of human tissue. Currently, each of these slides needs to be prepared, analyzed through a microscope, diagnosed, reported and archived. Digitizing these images will ease collaboration across sites and help reduce costs.
Digital pathology enables enhanced cooperation and access to sub-specialists, helping us improve turnaround times and ultimately advancing our goal of saving lives.
Sam Terese
CEO of Alverno Laboratories
“Alverno is committed to ensuring our patients and clinical colleagues receive the fastest, most effective and best-informed diagnoses possible by employing the latest technology innovations,” said Sam Terese, CEO of Alverno Laboratories. “Digital pathology enables enhanced cooperation and access to sub-specialists, helping us improve turnaround times and ultimately advancing our goal of saving lives.”
“The digitalization of pathology provides an opportunity to radically change the sector and remove daily obstacles that hinder pathologists via traditional microscopy,” said Marlon Thompson, General Manager of Philips Digital & Computational Pathology. “With digital pathology and the application of adaptive intelligence, we aim to help pathologists increase collaboration, boost efficiency and enable more accurate and precise diagnoses.”
Philips IntelliSite Pathology Solution is an automated digital pathology image creation, viewing, and management system comprising the Ultra Fast Scanner, the Image Management System and Display for clinical IVD use. This solution contains advanced software tools to manage the scanning, storage, presentation, reviewing, and sharing of images. By supporting the transition to digital workflows, Philips seeks to help pathology laboratories simplify access to histopathology information and implement more efficient workflows.
The Philips IntelliSite Pathology Solution is the first digital pathology solution marketed for primary diagnostic use in the U.S, for all FFPE surgical pathology slides, including H&E, special stains and immunohistochemistry.
