Five-year, turnkey deal covers hundreds of acute-care hospitalsGE Healthcare Services of Brooklyn Heights, OH, signed a five-yearagreement on March 2 to provide comprehensive equipment maintenanceand asset management services to hospitals owned

Siemens Medical Systems of Iselin, NJ, has received Food and Drug Administration 510(k) clearancefor an upgrade package that brings faster echo-planar imagingrise times to its 1.5-tesla Magnetom Vision MRI scanner. The packagewill be available as a free

FDA action comes in time for ACC meetingSomeone has lit a fire under medical device reviewers at the Foodand Drug Administration. While Congress debates reform of theagency and the way it approves medical devices, FDA staffers seemto have gotten

Toshiba's nuclear medicine division is adding enhancements to its line of gamma cameras.The Tustin, CA, vendor is planning to extend its transmission-emissionartifact-correction technique from its triple-head gamma camerasto its dual-head systems,

Russian market holds promise and pitfalls for vendorsAmid all the talk of emerging global markets for medical imagingequipment, one country often gets left out of the discussion:Russia. Despite the oversight, Russia and other nations in

Vendor to develop solid-state gamma cameraGE Medical Systems last week announced that it and two other companieshave been awarded grants sponsored by the U.S. and Israeli governmentsto develop a new type of nuclear medicine detector. The

Analogic has received 510(k) marketing clearance from the Food and Administration for Anatom2000, the company's mobile CT scanner. Analogic, of Peabody, MA,will begin the first shipments of the scanner this summer, withfull production beginning in fiscal

Agfa, Fuji and Kodak weigh in at RSNA showThe technology arms race is escalating in computed radiography,to the benefit of equipment purchasers. Competition between vendorsis driving improvements in CR's spatial resolution that bringit closer to

Workstation wars heat up in medical imagingCiting predictions of rapid growth in imaging workstation sales,Hewlett-Packard officials have disclosed plans designed to propelthe company into leadership in the medical imaging and

Kodak wins access to ultrasound workstationThere are three secrets to success in medical imaging's emergingera of DICOM 3.0 connectivity: integration, integration, integration.ATL of Bothell, WA, and Eastman Kodak of Rochester, NY, appearto have

GE Medical Systems has won Food and Drug Administration 510(k)clearance for Signa Horizon, the Milwaukee vendor's new 1-teslaand 1.5-tesla MRI platforms. GE introduced Horizon at the RadiologicalSociety of North America meeting last year (SCAN 12/28/94).

Sun and Silicon Graphics take aim at imaging Medical imaging's workstation vendors have yet to resort to cowboycostumes and animal sidekicks to move products, but they are turningup the promotional volume in anticipation of increased sales

IAP platform evolving into industry standardAs the once-distinct segments of medical imaging--PACS, teleradiologyand workstations--have blurred, companies that once sought toaddress different markets individually have had to adapt. Oneof the

PACS developer Cemax showed progress at the 1994 Radiological Society of North America meeting toward full compliance with the ACR-NEMA DICOM 3.0 standard while at the same time showing off networking capabilities gained through its alliance with

Nuclear medicine competitors Sopha Medical and Summit Nuclearserved notice last week that 1994's wild mergers and acquisitionsride didn't end with the Radiological Society of North Americameeting. The two firms closed the year with a bang by

Horizon is latest in high-field continuumGE shored up its offerings in MRI at this month's RadiologicalSociety of North America conference with new products at bothends of the field-strength spectrum. The Milwaukee vendor introducedSigna

Multiformat camera and PACS firmVisiplex Instruments last month acquired worldwide sales and marketingrights to Nuclear Data's IV 4600 film recorder, which recordsvideo images from modalities that use an ultra-high line videosignal. The acquisition is

PACS productsTelecommunications giantAT&T has signed an agreement with PACS developer Cemax ofFremont, CA, to resell the Cemax Perfect Vision line of medicalimage management products. According to the agreement, AT&T,of Somerset, NJ, will

Evolutionary trends marked the direction of product developmentfor new CT systems introduced at the Radiological Society of NorthAmerica meeting this month. To no one's surprise, spiral imagingremains CT's big selling point and helped this modality

Issaquah plant waited months for FDA go-aheadSiemens Medical Systems officials realized that sunny days wererare in Issaquah, WA, when they selected the often rainy Seattlesuburb in 1992 for the world headquarters of its ultrasound