The northeastern corner of Ontario — a vast area extending from just northeast of Wawa to Hudson Bay — has 51 hospitals and one permanent radiologist.

That’s why Northern Radiology (NORrad) was created seven years ago to allow nine of those hospitals to share digital diagnostic images such as X-rays and ultrasounds. Before NORrad, emergency-room physicians in remote communities with only limited diagnostic capabilities often had to ship patients out to larger centres.

Now 17 hospitals are tied in to NORrad, allowing a radiologist in Timmins and visiting specialists — known as locums — to read medical images remotely, which has greatly reduced the number of patients being transferred, says Guy Guindon, manager of NORrad’s medical imaging and cardiopulmonary department.

Especially in remote communities, that’s one big reason Canadian hospitals need to share medical images — something many still can’t do.

Picture archiving and communications systems (PACS) replace film with digital images, which must happen before hospitals can share them electronically.

The shift to PACS is nearly complete, says Mark Nenadovic, group director of programs for Canada Health Infoway, the federally funded non-profit organization promoting electronic health records across the country. But most are still limited to a single hospital or multi-site health-care organization.

Projects like NORrad have started breaking down those barriers across Canada.
Easier access to images

Another reason to share images is that patients don’t always visit the same hospital. If a Sydney, N.S., resident goes to Halifax to see a specialist, that specialist can look at any medical images taken of that patient in Sydney, says Sandra Cascadden, chief information and health transformation officer for the Nova Scotia Department of Health.

Images taken anywhere in the province are available because Nova Scotia is one of three provinces — the other two are neighbouring Prince Edward Island and Newfoundland — that have fully adopted diagnostic image sharing.

Alberta is well along with a similar system. More than 90 per cent of that province’s diagnostic images are digital, and all hospitals can share images within their health districts, according to Dan Sheplawy, executive director of Alberta Health and Wellness’s information systems delivery branch.

By the end of 2010, image-sharing will be possible between Alberta’s health districts.

British Columbia has image sharing in its Fraser and Interior health authorities and is working to extend it through the province.

The other provinces and territories are in various stages of implementation, Nenadovic says. Ontario and Quebec, the largest provinces with the most hospitals, each have some regional image-sharing projects but will not have provincewide sharing for at least a year.

Digital networks help to bridge staffing gaps at Canadian hospitals