BridgeHead takes poll position in the EMEA Independent VNA market

BridgeHead Software says that it is the leading independent Vendor Neutral Archive (VNA) provider in EMEA according to data from the latest research by IHS, the leading global source of information and analytics. The report entitled ‘Medical Enterprise Data Storage - World – 2013’ provides a comprehensive global VNA assessment and an in-depth understanding of the current structure and future development of this market.

Jim Beagle, CEO of BridgeHead Software commented, “We are delighted with these results. We have worked hard to help hospitals understand the opportunity available to them for the long-term management and protection of their clinical images and other types of data – both clinical and administrative. Whilst some NHS Trusts are looking at short-term tactical solutions as they embark on PACS replacements following the end of the National Programme for IT, many have seen the value in adopting a more strategic approach to their data management.”

IHS defines VNA as technology that consolidates PACS storage, within or across hospital departments and allows the sharing and management of image data and non-image data in a way that optimises clinical workflow.

IHS lists the key minimum features that a VNA must meet: DICOM and HL7 communication, support for multiple PACS, non-DICOM data sharing, clinical lifecycle management, security, long-term archive and disaster recovery.

Beagle continues, “We have long argued that the definition of VNA needs to be far more encompassing than just clinical image management, but refer to all data management and we applaud IHS for getting its definition, in our opinion, right. Today, VNA is a buoyant market and I am confident that our position in this latest report will be further cemented by several new name wins soon to be announced in the UK.”

BridgeHead Software provides a Healthcare Data Management (HDM) Solution that enables hospitals to efficiently manage all of their systems and data, within one environment. BridgeHead Software’s HDM offers a VNA for DICOM images and a compatible archive for non-DICOM files, featuring a rich policy engine used for Information Lifecycle Management (ILM), and controlling features like encryption and compression. BridgeHead Software’s HDM also offers comprehensive protection of all manner of data found within healthcare environments, from medical images, scanned patient documents, and patient notes, through to email, PDFs and other office type files.

The VNA annual revenues for EMEA are placed at $51,112m for 2013, a 188% year on year growth (2012: $17,735m) and are expected to reach $115,307m by 2015.