Agfa DR 600 Case Study at Hull Royal Infirmary

The 700-bed Hull Royal Infirmary in England, both a trauma center and a teaching hospital, replaced three older radiography rooms with three fully automated, ceiling-mounted Agfa DR 600 rooms. The systems were installed in 2021 and brought faster patient flow, higher image quality and a better experience for patients and staff. Agfa's reliable support and service were key factors in choosing the vendor.

Highlights

• Three radiography rooms equipped with DR Retrofit replaced by three fully automated DR 600 rooms
• One room next to the Emergency Department and two rooms for acute inpatients
• Flexible design of the emergency room without a fixed table to make the best use of limited space
• Each room up and running immediately after installation, with no initial issues
• Faster patient flow and immediate image viewing after exposure
• Auto-positioning and ZeroForce technology for easy tubehead movement
• EasyStitch for full leg / full spine imaging with one motorized wall bucky usable in all three rooms
• MUSICA image processing for right-first-time images, fewer retakes and adherence to the ALARA principle

About the hospital

Hull Royal Infirmary is run by Hull University Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust, one of the largest Trusts in England, providing acute services to a population of 600,000 and tertiary services to more than 1.2 million people. It is one of 26 major trauma centers in England and performs about 200,000 radiographic examinations per year.

History with Agfa

The Trust has been an Agfa customer since the transition from film to computed radiography (CR). In 2016 several radiography rooms were equipped with DR Retrofit, followed by a DR 400 room and a DX-D 100 mobile unit for different sites. For these high-throughput rooms, however, several systems on the market were evaluated, and the DR 600 was chosen for its precision, the ease of handling the tubehead and table, and its fit with the room space.

Results

According to the Trust's specialist manager for general radiography and fluoroscopy, patient flow is much faster. The radiographer can prepare the room before the patient arrives, check the patient ID on the tubehead and change exposure factors. The system is fully automated to reduce dose, but manual exposure adjustment is still possible. The DR 600 adapts well to the unpredictable conditions of the Emergency Department, including patients who cannot cooperate with positioning.

Previously only the emergency room had full leg / full spine capability, and the fracture, orthopaedic and scoliosis clinics had to use that busy room. Now one motorized FLFS wall bucky can be used in all three rooms. At the hospital's request, two rooms were also designed with wall graphics to create a friendlier environment for patients.

About the DR 600

The DR 600 is a ceiling-mounted, fully automated, high productivity direct radiography (DR) room that simplifies workflow and increases throughput. EasyStitch technology minimizes distortion in full leg / full spine images, and ZeroForce makes movement easy for the operator. Like all Agfa DR systems, it works with MUSICA software and a single user interface.