Lexmark International has acquired PACSGEAR, which develops connectivity technology to manage and share medical images and integrate them with picture archiving and communication systems and electronic medical records.

Acquired for approximately $54 million in cash, PACSGEAR will be folded into Lexmark subsidiary Perceptive Software. Officials say the acquisition will enable Perceptive to offer a vendor-neutral, standards-based clinical content platform for sharing patient imaging information within and between healthcare facilities.

PACSGEAR's health IT solutions capture, manage and integrate documents, film and video, visible light and other images from any department with any PACS or EMR. Healthcare personnel in specialties such as radiology, cardiology or orthopedics can connect to, view and share patient medical images and analyze results to enable better health information exchange.

"As the healthcare industry continues to digitize its differing forms of content, from X-rays and MRIs to insurance forms, providers are struggling to deploy solutions that will help manage their unstructured information challenge," said Paul Rooke, Lexmark's chairman and chief executive officer in a press statement.

The technology works in tandem with Perceptive Software's existing healthcare content management and workflow solutions and vendor neutral archive platform, enabling universal access to patient images, records and information, within and between different healthcare providers, officials say.

"Perceptive Software offers a comprehensive set of technologies for the clinical and business operations of healthcare providers – process and content management, intelligent capture and enterprise search for managing unstructured business content; VNA for viewing and managing clinical content; and now, with the addition of PACSGEAR, a leading PACS connectivity platform to provide medical image capture, sharing and workflow," said Scott Coons, chief executive officer and president of Perceptive Software, and vice president, Lexmark, in a statement.

PACSGEAR technology is deployed in more than 50 countries and approximately half of all U.S.-based hospitals. Customers include Kaiser Permanente, Henry Ford Health System, Hospital Corporation of America (HCA), Mount Sinai Hospital, Stanford Hospital & Clinics, and The University of Chicago Medical Center.

"PACSGEAR and Lexmark share a vision to make all content available when and where it's needed, throughout the healthcare enterprise," said Brian J. Cavanaugh, president, PACSGEAR.

[See also: PACS Americana: The U.S. radiology IT market is saturated and stable, but change is on the way]