Quality

The focus of quality improvement in healthcare is to bolster performance and processes related to diagnostic and therapeutic procedures. Leaders in this space also ensure the proper selection of imaging exams and procedures, and monitor the safety of services, among other duties. Reimbursement programs such as the Merit-based Incentive Payment System (MIPS) utilize financial incentives to improve quality. This also includes setting and maintaining care quality initiatives, such as the requirements set by the Joint Commission.

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lung cancer pulmonary nodule

Overaggressive lung nodule evaluation saddling patients with excess costs, radiation exposure

Patients who received a more intense course of evaluation tallied $20,132 more in expenditures, but saw no difference in late-stage cancer diagnoses, experts wrote in JAMA.

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Triage tool helps cut unnecessary CT imaging for blunt trauma without worsening patient outcomes

That’s according to a large, retrospective analysis of this intervention, detailed in RSNA’s Radiology.

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Radiology quality-improvement program could cut imaging spending by $433M if used across Medicare

The Radiology Support, Communication and Alignment Network, or R-SCAN, operates by having referrers, rads and patients work together to bolster imaging appropriateness. 

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Offering same-day cancer risk assessments, genetic testing to boost a breast imaging practice’s value

MD Anderson piloted radiology-operated, proactive testing to help diagnose high-risk women also undergoing imaging. 

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ACR seeks input in effort to address radiology’s deadly incidental findings conundrum

With the Closing the Results Follow-up Loop on Incidental Findings project moving to its next phase, college leaders want feedback from rads and patients. 

insurance payer payment insurer

CMS moves to ease burden, burnout stemming from onerous prior authorization policies

Practice leaders criticized the proposal for failing to include Medicare Advantage plans. 

Decreased imaging use among perks of CMS’ at-home inpatient care expansion, hospitals say

The feds are granting providers “unprecedented regulatory flexibilities” to treat more than 60 different acute conditions in a home-based setting.  

chest pain lung pulmonary embolism

Providers blunt skyrocketing use of CT for pulmonary embolism, but numbers still climbing

CTPA delivery leapt 450% between 2004 and 2016, but efforts from Choosing Wisely and others may have made a dent, experts detailed in JAMA Network Open. 

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Around the web

Health Imaging
Nearly $800,000 settlement offered to family of man who died during MRI exam

The patient, who was being cared for in the ICU, was not accompanied or monitored by nursing staff during his exam, despite being sedated.

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Global shortage of nuclear imaging isotopes may be over

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.

Cardiovascular Business
‘A huge win’: CMS significantly increases Medicare payments for cardiac CT

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.