To increase the capacity of cardiac scanning and improve the patient experience, St Joseph’s Hospital has installed the Aquilion ONE / INSIGHT Edition with the brand new INSTINX, making it the first hospital in Wales and the first private hospital in the UK to benefit from Canon’s most advanced CT system.
Last year, the Newport-based hospital treated around 69,000 patients in Wales and Southwest England, with the CT department being one of the most in-demand departments of the hospital. To help manage an increasing level of patient intake, St Joseph’s Hospital needed a scanning system that would be extremely fast, safe, and reliable to allow its team to diagnose as quickly and accurately as possible.
The Aquilion ONE / INSIGHT Edition offers an optimised workflow experience that is designed to set new standards in efficiency, consistency, and patient comfort. It utilises automated solutions such as one-touch patient positioning, and automatic scan planning to enhance usability and improve the overall scanning experience. By simplifying workflows, radiographers at St Joseph’s can focus on patient wellbeing, ensuring they are comfortable throughout the scan process.
Ben Day, Specialised CT and MRI Radiographer at St Joseph’s Hospital, comments, “Many patients are anxious when having a CT scan, often caused by a feeling of claustrophobia. In addition to offering a smooth scanning experience, the new CT system is much more spacious, which immediately puts patients at ease”.
Image quality has also been enhanced with the new system, which enables the hospital to produce high-quality scans of the entire body extremely quickly. For cardiac scanning in particular, rotations of the heart can be achieved in 0.24 seconds, enabling effective scans to be achieved under all circumstances – from high heart rates and fast trauma to paediatric scans. Equipped with a Deep Learning Reconstruction algorithm known as PIQE, the system enhances image resolution. Meanwhile, the rapid acquisition of image data helps to reduce motion artefact, meaning that high-quality scans can be achieved at a much lower radiation dose.
Andrew Morley, Consultant Radiologist at St Joseph’s Hospital, comments, “I have been extremely impressed by the cardiac images produced by the new CT system. Canon Medical has always stood out for cardiac scanning, but the new system has surpassed expectations. We can now achieve better resolution with PIQE higher-definition images, less blooming artefact, and at faster heart rates. Meanwhile, lung images are more detailed than ever, to the point where we are seeing detail not previously seen before”.
Commenting on the hospital’s longstanding relationship with Canon Medical, Ben Day adds, “Throughout our ten-year partnership, Canon Medical has understood our needs as a hospital and been supportive as the demands of our cardiac imaging suite have increased. With this install, the team have helped tailor a CT system and software package that works for our hospital and can meet patient demands both now and in the future”.
“We are incredibly proud to be the first hospital in Wales and the first private hospital in the UK to have this CT system. Knowing we have the best technology available that will produce images of the highest quality puts St Joseph’s Hospital at a real advantage when it comes to what we can offer within our CT department”, he added.
Thomas Laurie, Account Manager at Canon Medical Systems, concludes, “This project marks our second installation of the Aquilion ONE / INSIGHT Edition in the UK and has been a great success in Wales. With the added Aquilion ONE / INSIGHT Edition technology, our new CT scanner ensures that patients at St Joseph’s receive high-quality CT exams that are faster, safer, and easier to perform by clinicians. With INSTINX, workflow efficiency is increased by up to 40%, allowing the hospital to meet the growing demands of CT”.
