“Flexibility, speed and objectivity” are the key benefits that PathXL’s Integrated Digital Pathology Solution is providing to the Oxford Biomedical Research Centre. 

PathXL, a leading provider of Digital Pathology Workflow Solutions, today announced the completion of a contract with the Oxford Biomedical Research Centre to provide the centre with an integrated digital pathology solution.

Drug discovery studies within the research centre will be greatly accelerated and enhanced due to the ability of PathXL’s solution to enable timely and accurate image analysis, a pivotal part of the translational medicine pathway. 

The solution brings together:

• PathXL's own PathXL Manager Virtual Slide Management and Hosting software
• Image Analysis from Visiopharm
• A comprehensive ISO 27001 hosting service from PathXL to enable Oxford BRC’s virtual slide sets to be stored and managed securely on the latest SAN storage technology.

PathXL's software works seamlessly with almost every available scanner, including the Hamamatsu NanoZoomer recently selected by Oxford BRC.

PathXL’s management software and suite of specific applications enable users to upload, archive, search, share, collaborate and report on huge volumes of pathology data without worrying about performance, security or ease of use and without getting locked into expensive proprietary standards and systems. PathXL can either be provided fully deployed on the customer’s site or as a hosted service over the web. This hosted option allows users to realise the full benefits of digital pathology, without major capital investment and without the need to support the solution in-house. Sharing slides with partners, pathologists and pharmas is at the heart of Oxford BRC’s day to day requirements so an important benefit of using PathXL is that pathologists can review cases with full clinical information instantly from any remote location.

Visiopharm’s software provides efficient tools for extracting morphometric data from Whole Slide Images. It is designed specifically for Pathologists, providing simple controls for identification, classification, and quantification of nuclei, membrane, cytoplasm and other structures of relevance.   It allows Pathologists to work in true stain space (through colour de-convolution).  The technology is based on some of the most recent breakthrough research in image analysis and pattern recognition; and the software has been designed to reduce both the cost of learning and the cost of computing.  

Oxford Biomedical Research Centre is a partnership between the University of Oxford and Oxford University Hospitals, funded by the National Institute for Health Research. Oxford BRC undertakes translational research, meaning first time studies of medical innovations in patients, to improve healthcare delivery for all. 

The organisation funds or part funds 185 research projects across 10 therapeutic themes with a specific clinical focus, and 4 cross-cutting themes providing technology and innovation infrastructure for the clinical themes.

Oxford BRC chose PathXL because it uniquely provides:

• A robust and open digital pathology platform to support their national and international research collaborations,
• Pre-integration with Visiopharm’s best of breed Image Analysis framework,
• Flexible and reliable hosting options for any elements Oxford BRC chooses not to support in house,
• A wealth of other applications available on the same PathXL platform – such as biobanking, research and clinical workflow solutions.

Professor Runjan Chetty, Director of Translational Pathology and Consultant GI/Pancreatic Pathologist says: “By adding PathXL’s Digital Pathology services to what we have to offer gives us the flexibility, speed and objectivity needed for biomarker assessment in particular.  TMA’s stained with novel biomarkers are a pivotal part of the translational medicine pathway and the timely, accurate scoring that image analysis provides will lead to the more interesting, relevant molecules lending themselves to target and drug discovery studies.  We foresee several other research and educational applications using PathXL for the wider remit of Digital Pathology.”

Philip Murray, Executive Vice President of PathXL, said “We are really delighted to have been selected by Oxford BRC to be their digital pathology partner.  Oxford is one of the top biomedical research organisations in the world and their choice of PathXL is pleasing affirmation of the strength of the solutions we have to offer.  It also reflects a clear trend in the adoption of Digital Pathology - the technology has been widely accepted in education for some years, but the Oxford contract bears out our own experience that research organisations now view the technology as central to their work.  We look forward to helping Oxford enhance the efficiency and outcomes of their vital research programmes.“ 

About PathXL

PathXL specialises in web-based software and workflows for Digital Pathology.  Its PathXL™ Manager product provides a robust, secure and open web-based platform to enable digital pathology users across all fields to manage, view and collaborate around virtual slides easily and efficiently.  In addition, PathXL provides a range of applications and workflows on top of PathXL™ Manager to deliver specific solutions to pathologists, scientists and students in Education, Research, Clinical and Biobanking settings.  PathXL also provides a full range of supporting services, including scanning, hosting, image analysis and consultancy.  PathXL operates in the UK, Europe and North America.

PathXL is a privately owned company, headquartered in Belfast, Northern Ireland.  For more information please visit: http://www.pathxl.com