Health Imaging & IT - September 2008 - (Page 28)

in pRactice By Sarah Lamberti TELERADIOLOGY Relief for Brimming EDs To deal with increasing volume and to reduce wait times, many hospital emergency departments (EDs) as well as radiology groups are responding to stafﬁng shortfalls and high patient volumes by signing on a teleradiology service provider for daytime or evening image interpretation coverage. Patient ED visits are on the rise. In the last decade, the number of medical visits to physician offices and hospital outpatient and emergency departments increased by 26 percent from 1996 to 2006, faster than the growth of the U.S. population (which rose by 11 percent). It is not surprising that the average hospital ED wait-time to see a doctor has increased from approximately 38 minutes to nearly 56 minutes. Most ED visits occurred after business hours, defined as 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. on weekdays, with 63 percent of adults and 73 percent of children younger than age 15 arriving after business hours, according to new statistics from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). giving physicians a break Joe Langdon, evening imaging services manager at 365-bed Vassar Brothers Medical Center in Poughkeepsie, N.Y., attests to high ED volume—the center will approach 150,000 imaging procedures by year’s end and is currently averaging approximately 100 CT studies per night in combination with ultrasound and nuclear medicine exams. On evening shifts, from 7:30 – 11 p.m., they see a volume of approximately 25 to 50 studies and for the midnight shift, approximately 14 to 18 patients each night. With such a high volume, Vassar and its radiologists contracted with Imaging on Call (IOC) for ED coverage to relieve the burden on physicians a bit. “Instead of having people on call for CT, ultrasound and nuke med,” Langdon notes, “we wanted to have the ability to give physician’s relief, while providing them with the details they need in a timely, efficient way.” Due to the increased ED volume, Vassar is sending images directly from the imaging modality to IOC. “All we have to do is verify the study is on the site, ready for rads to read,” Langdon says. IOC’s average report turn-around time is 30 minutes. If a report isn’t back in a half hour or so, or is needed more urgently, Langdon simply calls IOC’s workflow team, which investigates the reason and immediately processes the report or verbally conveys the result. HealthImaging.com [ Bottom left: With no radiologists onsite, Syringa General Hospital in Grangeville, Idaho, uses Franklin & Seidelmann Subspecialty Radiology (F&S) to provide 24/7 teleradiology coverage. Bottom right: Staff at Syringa General Hospital can access reports created by F&S from any computer, anywhere in the hospital. ] 28 Health Imaging & IT | September 2008 http://HealthImaging.com

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Health Imaging & IT - September 2008 Table of Contents On the Web The Enterprise News Update Imaging Weighs the Evidence Radiation Oncology Tackles IT Integration PET/CT: Diagnosing Cardiac Disease—Adding Function to Form Modality Update People & Technology In Practice Reader's Resource Technology Outlook

Health Imaging & IT - September 2008

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