Transforming physical to digital

Many organizations attempting to digitize their pathology slides in-house find that their efforts fall short—digitization is not a core competency; it generally takes longer, costs more, and lowers overall efficiency.

Experienced Whole Slide Image digitization provider

We deliver a holistic service that spans the entire physical-to-digital pathology slide lifecycle. We digitize your physical glass slides within our more than 150 temperature-monitored pathology storage facilities that meet the 2021 US College of American Pathology (CAP) requirements. By creating Whole Slide Images (WSIs), we unlock the information on the slides, empowering your organizations with ready access to data.

Free up staff time and storage space, and position yourself for an AI future

• Leverage our extensive in-facility digitization services where your slides stay within the Iron Mountain storage facilities, protecting fragile slides from transportation and handling damage.
• Improve the efficiency of your overburdened staff and refocus their time on higher-value tasks.
• Digitize your pathology slides, turning them into digitally indexed and easy-to-find WSIs that support collaboration and feed your next-generation AI business initiatives.

Scanning as service capabilities

On Demand

• Request WSIs as you need them
• Access WSIs anytime, anywhere, eliminating physical slide wait times.

Archival

• Access large sets of archived WSIs
• Facilitate research, train artificial intelligence (AI) models, or monetize via marketplaces by accessing a digital image library.

Day-forward

• Digitize pathology slides from a designated point in time

What’s slowing down access to your information?

You are challenged to manage an ever‐growing volume of slides and blocks while maintaining inventory integrity and timely access to physical slides and Whole Slide Images (WSIs).

As organizations are asked to do more with less and the volume of specimens continues to grow, getting quick access to the slides and WSIs for review and research, facilitating efficient collaboration, and managing the proper storage and movement of these assets becomes an ever-increasing burden.

Digital Pathology storage solution

Digital storage

Choose from multi-cloud digital storage options supporting multiple digital file formats

• Iron Mountain Iron Cloud incorporates tiered digital storage.*
• We work with cloud storage providers available in your region
• Explore on-premise and private cloud storage

*Storage availability and requirements vary by country

Pathology labs must maintain security to guard protected health information (PHI) to comply with regulations. Digital pathology professionals experienced in asset preservation and compliance handle cost-effective image storage and management across scalable cloud storage.

Digitized images also enable organizations to participate in asset marketplaces, where images are collected, anonymized, and marketed for sale to enable and support in-house research.

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Physical storage

Utilize our pathology slide storage

• We manage more than 1 billion slides and blocks in more than 150 temperature-monitored facilities
• We adhere to the 2021 US College of American Pathology requirements*
• We provide services spanning the entire physical-to-digital pathology lifecycle

* Storage availability and requirements vary by country.

The need for physical storage space is growing, but storage space is at a premium, particularly in the facility itself or in high-value real estate areas where many facilities are located. In addition, temperature-monitored storage is needed for slides and blocks (tissue samples), which are the core elements of pathology.

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Moving and controlling data

Managing large whole slide image (WSI) datasets and maintaining the metadata that describes them is challenging, requiring a knowledgeable and experienced provider.

Managing Whole Slide Image data

We store and manage your large Whole Slide Images (WSIs) efficiently and securely while leveraging metadata to make finding and retrieving them easy. The WSI's data enrichment helps pathologists quickly find, view, group, share, and analyze the images for research or education purposes.

Our capabilities include:

Proprietary data transfer tool

Our robust data agent moves and manages the WSI data, providing you with access to it when you need it.

WSI data enrichment

We provide comprehensive metadata capture and enrichment for WSIs. Whether you provide a data file to pair with the WSI or only the labeling guidelines, we create the metadata, including your descriptions. Organized data empowers your analysis and retrieval while maintaining consistency, accuracy, and data integrity.

An end-to-end digital pathology services provider

Our Digital Pathology solution has many capabilities, allowing you to personalize it to your needs. Components include a secure web portal, slide digitization, digital viewing, whole slide image (WSI) management, and physical and digital storage.

Be ready for the future

We’ll position you for the future as Artificial Intelligence/Machine Learning (AI/ML) metadata extraction and knowledge graphs are available. Using the WSI metadata, the information can provide new insights supporting better decision-making. The WSIs can be viewed by humans, analyzed digitally, or used to train machine learning algorithms bolstering research or monetization via marketplaces.

Reap the advantages of a digital solution that increases your efficiency and effectiveness by partnering with us. As a capable and reputable service provider, we empower you with our Digital Pathology solution capabilities. Utilize our services rather than attempting to handle everything in-house and on-premises.

Our capabilities include:

Integrated pathology viewer

You have choices - our open platform supports integration with different viewers. Get the WSIs when needed, enabling authorized users to search, annotate, and share images, facilitating collaboration from anywhere with an internet connection.

Proprietary lightweight Image Management System (IMS)

You can filter, search, query, and group the WSI repository, giving you control over managing and turning your data into useful information.

Unlock faster pathology research

Iron Mountain Digital Pathology solutions have many research use case applications, such as:

• Cohort creation
• AI model training and validation
• Asset monetization

Lead your research organization toward achieving the following benefits:

Enhanced research accuracy and consistency

• Real-time analysis identifies patterns and correlations

Increased research efficiency

• Real-time feedback on model evaluation for faster iterations and collaboration

Improved profitability

Case Study: Technology startup uses artificial intelligence (AI) model training

A profit-driven technology startup needed help building cohorts of de-identified patient data to sell to biotech firms for AI model training. The startup required retrospective cohort digitization of thousands of slides, with plans to expand to 1.5 million slides. This volume was needed to deliver robust data sets for AI diagnostics and research.

Iron Mountain Digital Pathology solution provided large-scale retrospective/archival scanning services. Physical slides were converted into digital images suitable for aggregation and analysis.

Outcomes included:

• Handled massive data volumes by scanning thousands of slides and preparing for the expansion to 1.5 million slides
• Enabled AI training by supplying biotech firms with high-quality, de-identified data sets
• Facilitated innovation through the development and training of advanced AI models for research

Innovate in education

Utilize Iron Mountain Digital Pathology solutions in your educational settings, such as the following use cases:

• Student projects
• Webinars
• Grand rounds

Our Digital Pathology solution offers:

• Enhanced visualization
• Interactive and remote learning
• Access to diverse cases (not geography or facility dependent)

Case Study: Cancer Center with National Institute of Health (NIH) funding

A cancer center was at risk of losing NIH funding due to falling behind on its in-house scanning project. The inability to keep up with the volume of slides needing scanning threatened research, training, and funding.

Iron Mountain took on the overflow slide scanning responsibilities, ensuring that all necessary slides were quickly digitized, promoting ease of access and use.

Outcomes include:

• NIH funding was secured by helping the center meet its project deadlines
• Provided critical operational support during a period of high demand
• Enabled the center to continue its important cancer research and education without interruption