Mortsel, Belgium - June 1 2006 - 4.00 p.m. CET - Agfa HealthCare today announces that they have entered into an agreement with Sonix HealthCare Solutions (SHS) of Hauppauge, New York (USA) under which Agfa HealthCare will enable its Imaging Center customers to purchase the complete line of SHS financial and business consulting services in the United States. The agreement brings a key component to Agfa's integrated workflow solutions package for Imaging Centers, a market that is responsible for more than one third of the revenue within the diagnostic imaging market. Nearly 30% of those Imaging Centers currently outsource their billing services, creating an estimated $10 billion market for such services.
Imaging Centers are a key component of the diagnostic imaging market in the U.S. As healthcare services become more and more patient-centric and community-based, the number of Imaging Centers has grown from 4,000 centers in the year 2002 to more than 6,000 centers in 2006. This trend can be seen in other countries incl. France and Australia.
The integrated solution consists of Agfa HealthCare's scheduling, image capture and reporting solutions and SHS's revenue cycle management. By incorporating SHS's services with Agfa's IMPAX® RIS for Imaging Centers, Agfa HealthCare will offer a full-service turnkey solution that handles payer contracting, front end scheduling, compliance, practice management, billing and collection, managed care consulting and IT services.
Imaging Centers are primarily privately owned, independent healthcare facilities specialized in imaging-based diagnosis. Agfa's IMPAX® RIS for Imaging Centers complemented by the SHS solution will improve Imaging Centers' administrative efficiency and speed up billing and collection. In addition, the agreement gives Agfa HealthCare's customers the opportunity to leverage the resources and skills of the Sonix team, widely recognized as the industry standard for revenue cycle services.
"For many years, Sonix HealthCare Solutions has been well-known as a quality provider of financial and business services," said David Chambers, Vice President, Sales and Marketing, Agfa HealthCare, U.S. "Agfa HealthCare's workflow solutions, including our robust RIS/PACS, complemented with SHS management services makes Agfa HealthCare one of the only companies to offer a single comprehensive solution which helps to increase the productivity and profitability of healthcare providers."
"We are most proud of this new relationship with Agfa," said Richard Harris, CEO, Sonix HealthCare Solutions. "Agfa HealthCare's product offering is among the best in the industry. The strong mix of Agfa's proven technology combined with the SHS services will bring a comprehensive, state-of-the-art financial, business and technological solution for the healthcare provider to better service their patients."
End of message
About Agfa The Agfa-Gevaert Group is one of the world's leading imaging and information technology companies. Agfa develops, manufactures and markets analogue and digital systems for the graphics industry, the healthcare sector and specific industrial applications. Agfa's headquarters are in Mortsel, Belgium. The company is active in 40 countries and has agents in another 100 countries throughout the world.
The Agfa-Gevaert Group achieved a turnover of 3,308 million euro in 2005.
Agfa HealthCare supplies hospitals and other healthcare centers with state-of-the-art systems for the capturing, processing and managing of diagnostic images and with IT solutions that integrate information and imaging workflows into the overall hospital operations across departmental disciplines. In addition, Agfa is a leader in the fast growing market of IT systems that span the entire healthcare enterprise and through which healthcare facilities become more efficient and effective, with improved patient outcomes. For more information on Agfa, visit
www.agfa.com.
1US$ = 0.804281 Euro
Agfa, the Agfa rhombus and IMPAX are trademarks of Agfa-Gevaert N.V., Belgium or its affiliates. All rights reserved.
About Sonix HealthCare Solutions (SHS)
SHS has been a leading provider of practice and financial management consulting services to the healthcare industry for over 20 years. SHS is differentiated from its competitors by virtue of the fact that its genesis comes from being part of one of the oldest and largest privately held diagnostic provider organizations in the U.S. As a result, SHS has gleaned the expertise second to none in optimizing revenue for the clinical provider. SHS is information technology-centric, with particular focus on the latest financial management services, including coding, revenue cycle management, billing and collections, compliance, consulting, contracting, credentialing, practice management and reporting.
Contacts: Jeff Lewis
Media Relations Manager HealthCare, North America
tel: 201-440-2500 x4192
e-mail:
jeff.lewis@agfa.com Geertrui De Smet
Global PR Manager HealthCare
tel.: +32 (0) 3 444 73 06
fax: +32 (0) 3 444 72 85
e-mail:
geertruidesmet@agfapress.com Johan Jacobs
Corporate Press Relations Manager
tel.: +32 (0)3 444 80 15
fax: +32 (0)3 444 50 05
e-mail:
johan.jacobs@agfa.com Suzanne Kropp
Account Executive
Sanna, Mattson, MacLeod, Inc.
tel.: 631-265-5160
fax: 631-265-5185
e-mail:
skropp@smmadagency.com