VA Portland

Veterans Affairs Medical Center (Portland VA) is a 227-bed, acute care medical facility in Portland in Oregon. The VA Portland Health Care System offers a variety of health services to meet the needs of our nation’s Veterans. The Portland VA Medical Center is constantly busy and their radiology department sees a high volume of patients every day.

The Portland VA chose to partner with us in upgrading their hospital and clinic imaging suites last summer (2014). Eight new DR rad rooms and seven DR portables transformed the organizations’ capabilities and capacity for patient throughput and dose reduction. 

As per VISN policy, patient dose records are maintained for all modalities at the Portland VA. Historically, the technologist has had to annotate this information on paper logs. These logs are then delivered to the Radiologists to be included in the patient’s report. With the new capabilities of the Canon DR solution, the DICOM Structured Reporting has proven to be a valuable asset. The Canon DR modalities receive the patient dose data from the Dose Area Product (DAP) detectors incorporated into the DR suites and DR portable units. The Canon software is then able to send an X-Ray Radiation Dose Report via DICOM to the facilities’ Structured Report Server. The Structured Report Server receives the DAP patient dose information and automatically includes this data in the patients report. 

When installing the RADspeed rooms, we worked with the existing structures (power runs etc.) and then provided cost effective room drawings for each site (floor Box). Many companies don’t do this, but at times we provide our own as build drawings if none are available. All room measurements were double-checked many times during the project so no change orders were needed for this very large project. In some of the rooms at VA Portland, we had to custom cut the Overhead Bridge to work with the Patient Lift in the room, and do other minor tweaks and adjustments to accommodate the staff at the VA. 

Working with a company like ours that understands all the phases of installing, servicing, training, and turning over a high end DR proved well worth the investment for the VA. Throughout the construction process, the people in VA facilities and clinical engineering BIO-MED were fantastic, as well as the exceptional staff and Dr. Ronald Boucher’s team of Radiologists. The leadership our Oregon team exemplified with a bit of help from the boys up north was nothing short of superb. Thanks to the service team, applications, and support staff for their hard work. Our entire team had excellent communication and follow through with this project. Our application team do a wonderful job and still stop by and help with apps issues at the hospital. VA Imaging even put together a Super User group for doing their own training in the future. 

“People have asked us: how can a small local company get these large projects like this? My answer is to treat people with respect and ask yourself how you would want to be treated if you were the customer. This sale was somewhat easy for all of us involved. I would want the Shimadzu/Canon combo if I were VA personnel. It just cannot be beat.”                                             

– Jon Jacobson, Founder/ President of Core Medical Imaging (currently known as Shimadzu Medical Systems USA Northwest Branch) 

This project was handled in a fair and equitable way by VA Portland throughout the entire process. Every company had an opportunity to get this project, and the VA listened to us with an open mind. Getting a project of this size with a local small business means the money stays in the Pacific Northwest community. We provide jobs in the local community and serve 36 employees. The VA could have gone with the really big guys, but they decided that we had the best to offer at the right price, and we had the experience and personnel to install the equipment. We are pleased to say that we met all of our delivery dates, installation completion dates, and applications dates on time with no change orders. We have eight veterans working here at our company, so the VA Portland holds a special place in all of our hearts. It was a lot of work for all of us, but we feel we made a big difference in workflow and lowered the dose for the Veterans.

Check out this video that we filmed at VA Portland that shows the some of the auto-positioning and auto-park features of the Shimadzu RadSpeed Auto: