A Tweet from Penn Medicine radiologist and pretty good tipper, Saurabh Jha, MD.

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Imaging Centers

Growing with Desert Radiology

Desert Radiology executive Matt Grimes starred in a recent Aunt Minnie webinar, detailing the Las Vegas radiology group’s operational and growth strategy, and sharing some very relevant takeaways for imaging providers and vendors. 

About Desert Radiology – Desert Radiology (DR) operates 11 imaging centers, services 14 acute care hospitals across Southern Nevada, and staffs over 80 radiologists and 500 clinical/support teammates. DR was founded nearly 55 years ago, but it has nearly doubled its imaging centers and radiologist workforce in the last five years.

Challenges – Desert Radiology faces more than its share of challenges, some of which are unique to the Las Vegas area (large managed care population, no local radiology med school programs), and some that are common across the country (radiologist hiring/recruitment, competition, declining reimbursements, rising volumes).

Growth Starts from Within – In order to grow without burning out its team, DR restructured its shift schedules to better fit staff members’ needs and diversified its radiologist career paths to match their personal goals (e.g. multiple partner tracks, an associate track, and a telerad track). 

Engagement Pivot – DR previously relied on radio and billboard ads to reach new patients but pivoted towards a community engagement strategy, with a focus on outreach, charity work, and deepening its relationship with local providers and partners.

Population Health Partnerships – Because of Las Vegas’ high concentration of managed care patients, Desert Radiology places considerable focus on reducing unnecessary imaging and achieving early/accurate diagnoses. This patient environment has also driven DR to deepen its local healthcare relationships, leading to new population health-appropriate agreement structures and referrer programs.

Selecting The Right OEMs – When evaluating new scanners, DR first examines image quality by having its radiologists evaluate images while blinded to the scanner brands (avoiding bias). It then evaluates the proposed scanners’ ease of use, workflow fit, and overall value, before making a final decision.

DR’s Case for United Imaging – Grimes also detailed how Desert Radiology has benefitted from working with United Imaging (the webinar’s sponsor), specifically highlighting the value of UIH’s “Software for Life” (scanners automatically updated with future software) and “All-In” (scanners include all possible features/packages) policies.

The Takeaway – We get plenty of insights from the commercial and academic side of radiology each week, but operational insights are still rare, making this webinar particularly useful for the many imaging groups with similar goals and challenges as Desert Radiology.

MCRG’s Nuance Optimization

See how Florida’s Medical Center Radiology Group (MCRG) improved its workload distribution, team communication, and overall productivity after implementing Nuance’s PowerScribe Workflow Orchestration and PowerConnect Communicator solutions.

How AI is Changing Population Health

This Zebra-Med post details how AI is revolutionizing population health programs through automation, workflow integration, and significantly expanding early disease detection.

The Wire

• Automating AI with Multimedia Reporting: A Philips paper in JACR proposed a new radiology reporting process that they believe would address AI’s labeling, training, performance, and monitoring challenges. The novel annotation and dictation system would automatically create hyperlinks that connect report text with specific findings on medical images. They suggest that these links would produce stronger labels for AI training without hindering radiologist efficiency, while also creating an automatic feedback loop for monitoring and retraining already-deployed algorithms.

• Samsung’s Photon Counting CT Supply: After years of joint R&D, Samsung and 5N Plus announced that 5N Plus will supply Samsung with detector substrates used in Samsung NeuroLogica’s forthcoming photon counting CT imaging systems. Although Samsung has made its PCCT development efforts public in recent years, this supply announcement has greater relevance given Siemens Healthineers’ new PCCT FDA 510(k) and the recent PCCT detector maker acquisitions by Canon and GE.

• CT AI for Emphysema Severity: A new MGH study found that Siemens Healthineers’ AI-Rad Companion Chest tool can assess emphysema severity in chest CT scans with similar accuracy as radiologists. The researchers had the AI tool and two blinded thoracic radiologists assess 113 adults’ emphysema severity using non-contrast chest CTs (severity levels: mild, moderate, or severe), achieving very similar accuracy (AUCs: 0.77 AI & 0.76 rads).

• Siemens and Mizzou’s Online Alliance: The University of Missouri and Siemens Healthineers are teaming up to develop one of the first online clinical engineering programs in the U.S., following through on one of the main initiatives outlined in their 10-year strategic alliance. The University of Missouri will use a $2.6m state grant combined with Siemens’ support and technology to train, certify, and recruit future generations of clinical engineers.

• Radiology Zoom School: Speaking of online education, a new Insights into Imaging study suggests that far more radiology education will be held online in the future. The 244 radiologists from 31 countries overwhelmingly agreed that radiology is “particularly well-suited for online teaching” (91%) and estimated that 50% of radiology training is appropriate for online learning. That would be a big shift considering that only 12% of radiology training was online before the pandemic.

• Low-Field MRI for MS: A new UPenn-led study suggests that ultra-low-field portable MRI systems (ULF-MRI; in this case the Hyperfine Swoop) could eventually support point-of-care multiple sclerosis screening and monitoring. The researchers performed contrast-enhanced brain scans using the Swoop and a high-field MRI on 17 patients (15 w/ MS), finding that the Hyperfine scans had 100% sensitivity for detecting >5mm white matter lesions. The Swoop was able to detect Leptomeningeal contrast enhancement with 33% sensitivity, which is low, but could be improved in the future.

• Why Not Fear AI: A new JMIR paper detailed why future radiologists shouldn’t be as concerned about AI’s impact on their careers as many recent surveys say they are. The authors shared a long list of reasons why these AI concerns might be overblown (at least in the short term) including: 1) AI’s current performance limitations; 2) Healthcare’s disconnected and heterogeneous digital infrastructure; 3) Lacking AI literacy and training; and 4) Liability and ethical barriers.

• RamSoft Adds Imaging Sharing: RamSoft became the latest PACS player to expand into image sharing, making its new QR Snap app a standard feature in its PowerServer RIS/PACS platform. QR Snap allows imaging facilities to share patient images / reports with physicians using a QR code, while also allowing practices to provide patients with their QR codes. There are quite a few image sharing options, but this is the first we’ve heard of that comes standard with a PACS system.

• Neck US Consultations: A new Clinical Imaging study shared a solid case in favor of radiologist-patient consultations following neck ultrasound exams. The prospective/randomized study (109 patients, 44 who had rad consultations) found that radiologist consultations reduce patient anxiety during and after exams (P = 0.040 & 0.027), are viewed as important by most patients (92.7%), and do not significantly prolong exam times (7.6 vs. 7.3 minutes). 

• Imaging Centers Liable in Indiana: An Indiana court expanded the state’s medical malpractice rules to hold imaging centers “vicariously liable” for the negligence of independent entities’ employees and contractors (yes, they mean independent radiologists). This liability expansion is the result of a lawsuit that held both an imaging center and a contracted radiologist responsible for a missed diagnosis (spinal arteriovenous fistula), rather than just the radiologist. Indiana’s hospitals have been vicariously liable for this type of non-hospital negligence for over 25 years.

• PSU’s Photoacoustic Helmet: Penn State researchers are developing a wearable head scanner that uses photoacoustic imaging to help diagnose brain function and behavior health. With the help of a two-year $900k NIH grant, the team will develop a prototype wearable scanner, which they believe could become an attractive MRI alternative (no contrast, lower-cost, no extended in-bore periods, less infrastructure requirements) while achieving better image resolution and depth than current optical imaging approaches.

The AIR Recon DL Revolution

Check out this Imaging Wire Show featuring GE Healthcare’s US & Canada MRI leader, Brian Murphy, discussing MRI’s evolution and how AIR Recon DL is eliminating MRI’s signal, speed, and resolution compromise.

The Resource Wire

• Generate actionable insights by consolidating your data into one place, organized around the patient with Syngo Carbon.

• Do your patients text more than they use CDs? Find out how Novarad’s CryptoChart simplifies image access, combining secure QR codes and text and email communications to help providers and patients ditch the disk.

• All-in, For Life. Learn how United Imaging’s Software Upgrades for Life policy ensures that all devices can be updated every time United Imaging launches a new solution.

• This Fujifilm Healthcare blog outlines the criteria providers should consider for their image and reporting platforms, and how the Fujifilm VidiStar platform’s features, service, and vendor collaboration meet providers’ needs.

• Working out your AI business case? Check out this helpful Blackford Analysis report on how to calculate AI’s clinical, IT, administrative, and financial value to your organization.

• Check out this Imaging Wire Show interview with Riverain Technology’s Chief Science Officer, Jason Knapp, where we discuss the evolution of imaging AI, how to get generalizability right, AI’s path forward, and much more.

• See how East Texas Medical Center reduced its abdominal CT contrast volumes by 30% after adopting Bayer Radiology’s contrast dose management software.

• Did you know 80% to 90% of sonographers experience pain while performing scans at some stage in their career? Check out this Canon Medical Systems video detailing its latest innovations that improve sonographer comfort and help reduce risk of injury.

• See why American Hospital of Paris radiologist, PR Olivier Vignaux, says Arterys is his “favorite post-processing tool for cardiac MR,” in this user interview.