Radiology’s shift to more advanced modalities like CT and MRI is increasing the burden on radiologists to interpret more complex exams. A new study in JACR documents the trend, finding that radiologist workload for inpatient imaging has risen sharply over the last 10 years.
Like many physicians, radiologists are feeling burned out from rising patient workload, personnel shortages, and declining reimbursement.
- But radiology has the added burden of being one of healthcare’s most technology-focused specialties, with new imaging modalities giving them cooler tools to work with, but at the cost of steadily increasing exam complexity.
Researchers from Brigham and Women’s Hospital have been tracking inpatient imaging utilization for the past 40 years, and the new paper provides the latest update.
- They calculated inpatient imaging volume at Brigham and Women’s from 2012 to 2023, during which 896k imaging exams were performed.
Results for the study were as follows …
- Total annual inpatient imaging volume grew 17% over 10 years (102k to 119k exams).
- Total imaging exams per patient admission (adjusted by case mix and disease severity) fell 20% due to declines in X-ray, ultrasound, and nuclear medicine.
- But imaging exams per patient admission grew for CT (19%) and MRI (21%).
- Leading to growth in CT and MRI’s combined share of all radiology global RVUs (62% to 75%).
- Hospital length of stay rose 32% (5.6 to 7.4 days), possibly due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
What does it all mean? Basically, the number of inpatient imaging exams per patient is declining when adjusted for disease severity, but radiologists are still having to work harder because the studies are more complex.
- Imaging could also be shifting from the inpatient setting to outpatient centers due to reimbursement changes aimed at shifting exams to lower-cost settings than hospitals.
One big question with the new study is the degree to which the COVID-19 pandemic skewed the results compared with previous years.
- The pandemic may have spurred more use of CT, especially given its value in providing a definitive diagnosis of SARS-CoV-2 infection.
The Takeaway
If you feel like you’re working harder than ever, the new findings show that you’re not crazy. And given radiology’s breakneck pace of innovation, it’s not likely the trends revealed in the new study will let up any time soon.
