Forcare

Forcare — the Dutch software developer for management of data exchange and optimization of workflows. Software provides fast and uninterrupted data exchange between the different medical systems and information solutions at the level of departments, the enterprises and health care systems.

Forcare was founded in 2006 and by December of the 2017th totals about 70 employees. The headquarters of the company is in the Netherlands, offices are also located in Germany, Great Britain and Canada.

Among partners of Forcare for the end of 2017 there is a set of the companies developing the software in the field of medical information science and system IT integrators such as:

• TeraMedica — developer vendor - independent archive (VNA) of medical data (in 2015 it is purchased by Fujifilm company);
• Merge — developer of processing systems of medical images, the interoperable software and the clinical systems (in 2015 the company became a part of division of IBM Watson Health);
• McKesson is the pharmaceutical company and software developer for medical radiology;
• TeraRecon — developer of analysis systems of medical images;
• CTG is system IT integrator in Belgium;
• IMT is system IT integrator in the USA and Canada.

2017: Philips buys Forcare

In December, 2017 the Philips Healthcare company announced Forcare acquisition. The cost of the transaction was decided not to be disclosed.

It is noted that integration of developments and the Forcare command in structure Philips will allow to put on the market more effective information solutions for high-quality care of patients, improvement of results of treatment and optimization of infrastructure management of hospitals.

Philips Healthcare purchased software developer for integration of medical IT systems

In Philips Healthcare say that during an era of universal integration rendering qualitative and effective medical is impossible for the help without smoothly running uninterrupted communication and exchange of clinical information. The combination of solutions of Philips for storage and data processing (IntelliSpace Universal Data Manager), organization of workflow (IntelliSpace PACS), visualization (Illumeo), joint work (IntelliBridge Enterprise) and the interoperable Forcare platform will allow Philips to strengthen positions in the field of intellectual IT solutions and exchange of medical data.

{{the quote|Accession to Philips will allow us to come to our purpose – to provide compatibility and scalability of information systems in the field of health care for expansion of opportunities of doctors and patients — the CEO of Forcare Harm-Jan Vessels said.

It is supposed that this transaction assumes consolidation of the advanced IT solutions of Philips in the field of health care and the interactive Forcare platform that will provide effective interrelation of the different medical systems and adequate information transfer about the patient in hospital.

Functional compatibility of the different working systems – here that is required to health care, - Yair Briman, the head of department of medical information systems of Philips explained. – The impossibility of information transfer between the different medical systems, such as devices of visualization and information management system, is one of the main problems of IT heads of hospitals.

Briman says that merger of companies becomes one of top trends in the field of health care because the management aims at increase in efficiency. At the same time it is important to provide adequate data transmission between the systems of different providers to guarantee high quality of service of patients. Switching to a single standard system within the united companies will be very expensive, Briman therefore implementation of platforms of interaction should become the key solution for an information exchange problem considers.