OREM, UT – Toshiba leads a small group of top-performing medical equipment companies ranked by research firm KLAS in its annual report.

Top-ranked companies in seven key market categories - including computed tomography (CT), digital mammography, smart pumps and ultrasound - have earned the 2009 Best in KLAS distinction, signifying their leadership in meeting customer expectations.
 
While Toshiba snagged top ranking overall, Shimadzu took the 2009 Best in KLAS for its digital X-Ray.

"That's going to surprise some people," said Jeremy Bikman, KLAS vice president of strategic research.

For years in North America, the "big three" - GE, Siemens and Philips - have dominated the imaging equipment market, Bikman said.

Toshiba and Shimadzu are gaining recognition in small ways, he said. A GE shop, for example, might hear about one or the other. They will not  start replacing room after room, but rather one machine when the time is right. 

What put Toshiba at the top this year, Bikman said, was customer satisfaction. "That's the differentiator. Their customer satisfaction is really, really deep," he said. The score, he said,  takes into account relationships with sales people, people in the field, whether the company sticks to quotes.

"The goal of the Top 20 Best in KLAS Awards report has always been to give healthcare providers a resource for making informed technology decisions," said KLAS President Adam Gale. "From CT to ultrasound to MRI, this report shines a light on the performance of medical equipment vendors to help providers find the right product for their hospital or clinic, keep tabs on a current vendor or validate an operational decision. With ratings for more than a hundred modalities and other pieces of equipment, the Top 20 Best in KLAS Awards report brings together the collective experiences of thousands of healthcare organizations."

Based on evaluations submitted by thousands of healthcare providers throughout the United States and Canada, KLAS rankings measure a vendor's performance in areas like product quality, implementation, and service and support.
 
Following is a list of the 2009 Best in KLAS medical equipment vendor products:

• Computed Radiography (CR) - Multi-Plate
• Konica Minolta Xpress Dual Bay
• Mammography - Digital
• GE Senographe DS
• Computed Tomography (CT) - 64-slice+
• Toshiba Aquilion 64
• Smart Pumps
• B. Braun Outlook (LVP)
• Digital X-ray
• Shimadzu RADspeed
• Ultrasound
• Toshiba Xario
• Magnetic Resonance (MR) - 1.5T
• Toshiba Vantage

 
In addition to recognizing the Best in KLAS honorees, the 2009 Top 20 Best in KLAS Awards: Medical Equipment report also highlights the highest-performing medical equipment vendors across all market segments, known as the Top 20. This overall score can encompass additional categories such as 3T magnetic resonance (MR), interventional/cardiac X-ray, nuclear medicine and others. In the 2009 report, Toshiba was rated number one, with an overall performance score of 90.53 out of 100, followed by FUJIFILM, GE, Philips, Siemens and McKesson.