Economics

This channel highlights factors that impact hospital and healthcare economics and revenue. This includes news on healthcare policies, reimbursement, marketing, business plans, mergers and acquisitions, supply chain, salaries, staffing, and the implementation of a cost-effective environment for patients and providers.

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Researchers receive $3.7M to attempt robotic heart surgery inside MRI scanner

The group—which includes engineers, cardiologist, radiologists and other specialists—will attempt to perform a robotic-controlled left atrial appendage occlusion (LAAO) on a patient inside an MRI scanner.

Private practice IRs out-earn academic peers, but fuller comparison suggests a wash on quantifiable pros and cons

The academics turn the tables in median starting salaries, edging out private-practice interventional radiologists $380,000 to $374,000 while also working fewer weekly call days.

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7-state imaging powerhouse consolidates presence in the Garden State

An investor-backed practice in the Northeast has acquired the radiology operations of a practice that runs six imaging centers in New Jersey.

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How radiologists can find stability during economic volatility

Sponsored by vRad

With the amount of volatility and uncertainty in the U.S. economy, it’s no surprise that even radiologists, who are used to being in high demand, are starting to wonder: How would a recession affect my current employment?

GE nudges GE HealthCare to the edge of decisive departure

GE HealthCare just got pushed closer to the point at which it will have to spread its wings and fly unassisted from its parent’s nest.

Interview with Stamatia Destounis, MD, FACR, a radiologist and managing partner at Elizabeth Wende Breast Care in Rochester, New York, chair of the American College of Radiology (ACR) Breast Commission, serves on the Public Information Advisors Committee for Radiological Society of North America (RSNA) and on the Society of Breast Imaging (SBI) Communication Committee. She discusses post-COVID economic issues facing breast imaging centers, including the "great resignation" and lower reimbursements.

VIDEO: Issues with the great resignation and lower reimbursements in breast imaging

Stamatia Destounis, MD, FACR, a radiologist and managing partner at Elizabeth Wende Breast Care in Rochester, New York, and chair of the ACR Breast Commission, discusses post-COVID-19 economic issues facing breast imaging centers, including staffing problems from the "Great Resignation" and lower reimbursements. 

Patients digging deeper into household budgets for imaging exams that aren’t mammography

Why are patients paying far less out of their pockets for mammography now than two decades ago—while shelling out a lot more for other common imaging exams?

Example of the four types of breast tissue density. The density of fibroglandular tissue inside the breast impacts the ability to easily see cancers. Cancers are very easy to spot in fatty breasts, but are almost impossible to find in extremely dense breasts. These examples show craniocaudal mammogram findings characterized as almost entirely fatty (far left), scattered areas of fibroglandular density (second from left), heterogeneously dense (second from right), and extremely dense (far right). RSNA

Breast density notification laws blanket 90% of U.S. women, yet still no national reporting standard is at hand. Why is that?

Dense breast experts Wendie Berg, MD, and JoAnn Pushkin, executive director of DenseBreast-info Inc., explain the current status of breast density patient inform laws, reimbursement and new technologies to aid cancer detection. 

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.