At the most recent meeting of the Radiology Business Management Association in Charlotte, a new model for independent group practice collaboration was proposed to practices around the country. The model allows independent practices to succeed and is an alternative to the traditional radiology group alignment models of merger, acquisition, or outright takeover by a hospital or a private equity group. These collaborations can take different forms, but they share the same underlying goals: gaining the necessary resources to fulfill the needs of their primary clients—hospitals, payors and patients—inclusive of delivering meaningful information and decision support.

The groups interviewed below were seeking a way to bring advanced analytical capabilities to themselves and their hospital partners—analytics that transcend the descriptive and diagnostic and enter the more powerful realm of the predictive and prescriptive. With these analytics supporting them, they know they will be well positioned to succeed in meeting the needs of their partners in the developing health care environment.

As one of the radiologists acknowledges, the solution had been hiding in plain sight all along, and once market changes necessitated a new approach, it became obvious. By joining together in a JV affiliation, the groups will acquire the scope and scale necessary to produce the powerful analytics they need—analytics that will fundamentally change the way they engage with their partners now and in the future.