Imaging Informatics

Imaging informatics (also known as radiology informatics, a component of wider medical or healthcare informatics) includes systems to transfer images and radiology data between radiologists, referring physicians, patients and the entire enterprise. This includes picture archiving and communication systems (PACS), wider enterprise image systems, radiology information. systems (RIS), connections to share data with the electronic medical record (EMR), and software to enable advanced visualization, reporting, artificial intelligence (AI) applications, analytics, exam ordering, clinical decision support, dictation, and remote image sharing and viewing systems.

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Playing the name game: Radiologists find 342 ways to describe a normal thyroid gland

Radiologists use “variable and complex” language to describe normal thyroid glands in chest CT reports, according to a new study published in the Journal of the American College of Radiology. Could this have a negative effect on patient comprehension?

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Patient awarded $540K after misfiled radiology report results in missed tuberculosis diagnosis

A patient from Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada, has been awarded 700,000 Canadian dollars (more than $540,000) due to a missed tuberculosis diagnosis back in 2008.

Language barrier: 60% of oncologists routinely confused by radiology reports

Referring physicians are increasingly struggling to understand radiologists’ jargon in written imaging reports, a trio of California physicians wrote in the Journal of the American College of Radiology this week. That lack of communication could result in misguided treatment.

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Researchers use NLP techniques to extract data from free-text radiology reports

Natural language processing (NLP) techniques can help extract relevant data from free-text radiology reports, according to a study published in Journal of Digital Imaging.

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Radiologist shares firsthand account of treating terror attack victims

On July 14, 2016, a terrorist drove his truck through a large crowd in Nice, France, killing 86 people and injuring more than 450. Nicolas Amoretti, MD, with the department of radiology at Centre Hospitalier Universitaire de Nice, helped treat patients in the immediate aftermath of the attack.

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UK healthcare organizations speak out: Radiology workforce needs backup to handle breast screening backlog

Public Health England (PHE) revealed this month that, since 2009, approximately 450,000 women around the age of 70 were not sent invitations to receive breast cancer screening due to an IT issue. Jeremy Hunt, the U.K.’s health and social care secretary, has said the government will provide catch-up screening to women under the age of 72 within six months.

Redefining the imaging report in 2018: ‘Radiologists can and must do better'

Granting radiology patients access to online patient portals is growing transparency in the field, Atlanta radiologist Nadja Kadom, MD, and colleagues have reported in the Journal of the American College of Radiology—but a lack of health literacy across the country is compromising the success of such an idea.

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Structured reporting drops revision rate by 50% for CT angiography exams

Radiologists and referring physicians prefer structured reports—and they present concrete advantages to free-text alternatives. Recent research showed structured reports can reduce errors, help standardize resident training and improve recall of important information.

Around the web

The nuclear imaging isotope shortage of molybdenum-99 may be over now that the sidelined reactor is restarting. ASNC's president says PET and new SPECT technologies helped cardiac imaging labs better weather the storm.

CMS has more than doubled the CCTA payment rate from $175 to $357.13. The move, expected to have a significant impact on the utilization of cardiac CT, received immediate praise from imaging specialists.

The all-in-one Omni Legend PET/CT scanner is now being manufactured in a new production facility in Waukesha, Wisconsin.