VR profits rise on growing revenues

VR profits rise on growing revenues
First-quarter revenues and profits rose at Virtual Radiologic Corporation, leading the teleradiology company to boost expectations for 2009. Virtual Radiologic reported net income of $2.4 million for the quarter ended June 30, a 19% jump from the previous year’s first quarter. Revenues rose 18% to $30.6 million for the quarter from $25.9 million in the year earlier period. The improved financials were driven primarily by a 16% increase in the number of hospitals and medical facilities served to 1,085, generating a 24% increase in the number of interpretations. In light of this growth, company execs increased earnings expectations to a range between 63 cents and 67 cents per share on revenue of $118 million to $120 million. The company previously had forecast earnings of 58 cents to 61 cents per share on revenue of $113 million to $117 million.

Medical community calls for isotope action
The SNM and a coalition of eight medical organizations have issued a white paper urging Congress to take steps to maintain adequate supplies of molybdenum-99, the radioactive substance that decays into widely used radioisotope, technetium. U.S. Representative Edward Markey (D-Mass.) has introduced legislation (H.R. 3276) reflecting many of the coalition's concerns, according to the SNM. The coalition and SNM have endorsed the legislation. More than 80% of all nuclear medicine procedures involve technetium. Problems with the nuclear reactors now making moly 99 have led to recurring shortages over the last several years. The coalition behind the paper supporting the development of alternative sources of moly 99 includes, in addition to SNM, the American Association of Physicists in Medicine, American College of Radiology, American Nuclear Society, American Society of Nuclear Cardiology, American Society for Radiation Oncology, Council on Radionuclides and Radiopharmaceuticals, Health Physics Society, and Nuclear Energy Institute.

Carestream lands data storage deal
Carestream Health has cut a five-year managed services agreement with Maasstad Ziekenhuis in Rotterdam, the Netherlands for remote storage of medical data. Over 70 terabytes of legacy data will be migrated to the datacenter, which will serve as a PACS neutral remote archive, with additional archiving of approximately 180,000 new studies generated annually by the Maasstad facility.

TeraRecon, Agfa ally on cardiac CT
TeraRecon and Agfa Healthcare have combined advanced visualization tools with cardiology PACS, creating the first commercially available cardiac CT image analysis and reporting product to satisfy the requirements and many of the recommendations established by the Society of Cardiovascular Computed Tomography (SCCT) for cardiac CT interpretation. The two companies commercialized their integrated technologies just months after the SCCT guidelines were publicly released. The combined products bring together TeraRecon’s iNtuition cardiovascular advanced visualization tools and Agfa HealthCare’s IMPAX cardiovascular imaging and reporting PACS.