Radiologists collect $90M in research funding from imaging industry, with overall share of pie falling

Radiologists received over $90 million in research dollars from imaging industry sources but are seeing their total share of the overall pie fall, experts warn. 

Altogether, members of the specialty collected nearly 5,800 of these payments in 2024, from sources such as pharmaceutical companies and imaging device manufacturers. Radiologists’ payments represented about 1.1% of the total market, down from over 1.3% as of 2019, when the specialty collected about $89.1 million, researchers detailed April 16 in JACR. 

Experts believe these figures are important as radiology and other specialties grapple with government spending cuts that may increasingly force physicians to rely on corporations to drive their scientific work. 

“As federal funding faces uncertainty, the specialty's relatively small share of industry research funding—with a declining proportional share over time—suggests limited alternative support,” Ajay Malhotra, MD, with the radiology department at Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut, and co-authors concluded. “Understanding radiology's relatively small share of industry research funding has implications for the specialty's research capacity and innovation pipeline,” they added later. 

The study utilized information from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services’ Open Payments Database, created to foster more transparency around physician-industry relationships. Experts note that the drop in radiology’s share of the approximately $8.5 billion spent occurred “despite substantial growth” in the imaging industry during this time. 

Radiologists working at academic hospitals received about 24% of overall imaging research dollars ($22 million) and only one-third of the funding collected by other non-teaching entities. Overall, about 71% of imaging industry funding goes to these “non-covered entities,” which also include research institutions. The top three industry contributors to radiology research payments were pharmaceutical companies with oncology immunotherapy agents, rather than imaging-specific products, the authors noted. In 2024, they included Novartis ($10 million), Merck Sharp & Dohme ($8.7 million), and AstraZeneca ($7.3 million). 

“This suggests that a big proportion of radiology's industry research funding derives from imaging endpoints in cancer trials rather than development of better diagnostic tools,” the authors noted.  “The concentration of pharmaceutical R&D investment in oncology may explain why radiology's proportional share is declining even as absolute funding increases—radiology's role is increasingly as a service specialty providing imaging endpoints for oncology trials rather than as a primary research focus,” they added later. 

A secondary analysis showed that only about $1.04 million in artificial intelligence-specific research payments went to radiologists in 2024. This represents a “surprisingly modest figure,” Malhotra and colleagues noted, given that radiology accounts for about three-fourths of all approved AI devices. Experts believe the “minuscule proportion” paid to radiology investigators “raises concerns” about the low emphasis AI vendors may be making to assess the clinical effectiveness of algorithms in radiology practice. Industry research payments were highly concentrated, with the top 20th percentile of radiologists (189 of 898) receiving about 80% of the total amount. 

Malhotra and colleagues believe their findings are important as the specialty grapples with drastic cuts to the National Institutes of Health and other federal funding sources for scientific research. 

“Professional societies and academic departments may need to develop strategies to increase radiology's competitiveness for industry-sponsored research, particularly at teaching hospitals,” the authors urged. 

Read more, including potential study limitations, in the Journal of the American College of Radiology.