Radiology

For me, the collegiality of the practice of radiology is a highlight of my daily work. When I first considered leaving a traditional practice for teleradiology, I was worried that working remotely would leave me feeling disconnected. In actuality, I’ve never felt more engaged in a supportive and interdependent team committed to delivering quality patient care.

Over 4 billion people – two-thirds of the global population – do not have access to imaging technology or radiology services, according to RAD-AID. The lack of effective diagnostic tools has dire consequences for patients in unserved and underserved regions of the world.

Moving past the initial media hype, practitioners are beginning to demonstrate how AI applications can enhance the ability of radiologists to support better patient outcomes.

Claim denials drive up the cost of healthcare and divert resources from the primary goal of delivering quality patient care. When it comes to radiology services, the vast majority of claim denials can be attributed to insufficient documentation of medical necessity for three types of studies.

Claims management is essential to patient care. If a facility is not properly reimbursed for medical services rendered, patient care will ultimately be compromised.

Hospitals and clinics are integrating more tele-services into their everyday protocols as the telemedicine model continues to demonstrate the potential for them to deliver better, more cost-effective care. However, while new protocols for providing quality care are rapidly evolving, many organizations continue to follow internal credentialing bylaws and standards developed to support a dated paradigm.

Patient safety is the name of the game in credentialing. It is a process essential to ensuring quality care. However, the traditional primary source verification (PSV) approach to credentialing is antiquated in the age of telemedicine.

As the CIO of Radiology at MEDNAX and vRad, I cannot help but reflect on the history of imaging informatics – and look ahead to the future innovations that emerging technology will bring.

Radiologists must design protocols that enable clinical partners to achieve stroke certification. Medicine is at the forefront of a revolution in stroke diagnosis and treatment, as my colleague Dr. Dym elucidated in 2018.