Amid concerns about equitable access to healthcare, questions have arisen about imaging deserts – U.S. regions without any access to radiology services. A new study in Academic Radiology probes the issue, finding that it may not be as bad as originally feared – for reasons unique to radiology.
Uneven access to healthcare – particularly in rural regions – has become a common refrain in analyses of the U.S. healthcare system.
- In radiology, the issue has reached into the debate over workforce shortages as open jobs go unfilled in rural areas while urban positions are snapped up quickly – a trend one job board dubbed “geographic inconvenience.”
But how common is a complete lack of access to imaging? And what are the correct public policy tools to address it?
- In the new study, researchers assessed imaging availability in U.S. counties by determining whether imaging equipment, local radiologists, or both were available.
In their analysis of 3.1k U.S. counties covering 340.1M residents, researchers found…
- Only 1.9% of Americans (6.4M people) lived in true imaging deserts, where there was neither installed imaging equipment nor a local practicing radiologist.
- 7.6% of Americans (25.9M people) lived in counties with an installed scanner but no local radiologist.
- 0.1% lived in a county with a local radiologist but no equipment.
- 90% (307.4M) were considered “fully served” by imaging, with local image acquisition available and some kind of remote interpretation possible.
The statistics point to radiology’s advantage over other medical specialties that require doctors to be physically present to deliver care.
- Thanks to teleradiology, images can be acquired locally with installed equipment and then transmitted to central hubs for interpretation.
But even if less than 2% of the population lacks access, 6.4M Americans is a lot of people. How does living in an imaging desert affect their access to radiology?
- Researchers found that imaging use rates were 6% lower in imaging deserts compared to fully served regions, while Medicare payments per beneficiary were 8.9% lower.
The Takeaway
The new findings on regional access to imaging show that while most Americans have good access to radiology services, more work is needed to improve care for those who don’t. This is particularly true for services like interventional radiology that require radiologists to be present.
