Why Legacy Radiology Systems Are Failing Saudi Arabia

Many hospitals across Saudi Arabia remain tied to traditional systems from vendors like Agfa, GE, Siemens, Philips, or PaxeraHealth. These platforms were designed in an era of on-premise server rooms and siloed hospital infrastructure. They follow long, rigid upgrade cycles, offer minimal flexibility, and often come bundled with expensive licensing and maintenance contracts. For healthcare providers trying to keep pace with Vision 2030’s transformation goals, these systems are increasingly a burden rather than a backbone.

Legacy RIS/PACS solutions were never built for real-time radiology, national-scale interoperability, or AI-enabled diagnostics. They fall short in enabling modern clinical workflows — especially those requiring dynamic triage, cross-department collaboration, and cluster-wide reporting. Most fail to integrate smoothly with Saudi e-health platforms, lack localization for regional workflows, and often ignore the specific clinical and administrative realities faced by Saudi hospitals. The result is a growing gap between what healthcare providers need and what legacy vendors deliver.

Saudi Arabia’s healthcare system is evolving rapidly, and the pressure to modernize radiology is only increasing. Hospitals can no longer afford to wait years for vendor-driven upgrades, struggle with tools built for foreign systems, or risk costly system migrations. The future demands a new approach — one that’s modular, cloud-native, AI-ready, and designed for Saudi infrastructure and compliance from day one. HaithamAI isn’t just a replacement for outdated tools; it’s a strategic enabler for institutions aiming to lead the next era of digital healthcare in the Kingdom.