2013-03-18 18:57:24 - Independent healthcare provider Care UK has taken delivery of four brand new state-of-the-art ultrasound scanners after receiving new Any Qualified Provider (AQP) accreditations to offer health scans in 14 regions across England.

These new accreditations complement the organisation’s current contracts in east Cheshire, Suffolk, Wirral, Essex, London, Leeds, Oxford and Kent.

Janet Ritchie, national clinical imaging lead, said: “These services involve providing ultrasound scanning in communities – taking them to patients instead of people having to visit a hospital. Our new accreditations are in regions all over the country, so the scanners will be deployed to various locations. We set up mobile clinics in GP surgeries, community hospitals, walk-in centres and some of our NHS treatment centres. Patients are then referred to us by their GP.

“We chose the GE Healthcare systems because they perform exceptionally well for the abdominal and musculoskeletal scans that we offer. Their compact size is a great advantage because

they fit into a suitcase on wheels so the whole kit can be easily transported.

“They look just like a large laptop, but allow us to scan for everything from cysts to tumours and everything in between. The procedures are painless and safe – we simply scan the affected area of the body to see if there are any irregularities – then return the result to the patients GP within 48hours.”

The Care UK Community Diagnostics team provides a range of high quality ultrasound, DEXA and X-ray services on behalf of the NHS. For further information visit www.careuksmi.co.uk or call 0333 321 8844.