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VA Rad Exodus ‘Tip of Iceberg,’ Self-Referral Costs, and Redlining Impact
September 3, 2026
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Together with
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“Imagine not getting critical diagnoses for ER patients until 10-12 hours later!”
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Anonymous source on diagnostic delays in the VA’s National Teleradiology Program.
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Medical imaging is playing a growing role in the life sciences industry, such as by helping analyze patient response to pharmaceutical candidates during clinical trials. That’s why everyone here at Insight Links is pleased to announce the launch of The Bio Wire, our latest newsletter targeted at the biotech and life sciences industries. Give it a read today. – Brian Casey, Managing Editor
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A “mass exodus” of radiologists from the VA’s medical center in Washington, DC, represents just the tip of the iceberg for the health system’s radiology personnel woes. Other VA centers are reported to have seen similar departures, and the VA’s teleradiology program appears to be buckling under the strain.
News about radiologist staffing problems in the VA came to light in July with the publication of news articles claiming that the Trump administration’s 2025 ban on remote work for federal employees had prompted most radiologists at the VA Washington DC Medical Center to quit.
- While the ban was later rescinded for radiologists, the edict reportedly “spooked” many radiologists who were already chafing under VA salaries that were far lower than what they could find in the private sector.
An investigation by the VA’s Office of Inspector General confirmed the Washington, DC, medical center’s problems, documenting the departure of four of the facility’s five full-time radiologists as well as its chief of radiology.
- But the question remained – how widespread are the VA’s radiologist staffing woes, and have the same problems occurred at other VA medical centers?
Indications are that it’s a growing problem. A VA employee who contacted The Imaging Wire reported that VA radiology departments around the U.S. “got decimated,” with some losing 50% of their radiologist staff.
- This includes VA medical centers in Houston, Dallas, and San Antonio, and a number in Florida.
Interestingly, the source claims that the return-to-office edict has only been a “minor” contributor to the exodus, instead attributing the departures to a vicious cycle of lower salaries and higher workload.
- The VA’s salary cap of $400k simply isn’t competitive with private-sector radiology, where a recent compensation survey pegged average U.S. radiologist compensation at $610k – a 53% difference.
The shortage of in-person radiologists is prompting the VA to lean more heavily on its National Teleradiology Program, an operation headquartered in Menlo Park, California, that employs dozens of radiologists to interpret imaging studies overnight and on weekends.
- But NTP is facing a personnel exodus of its own, especially after NTP officials required daytime radiologists to pick up the slack by also working nights and every other weekend. The source estimated that, at its peak, NTP had about 120 radiologists. That number now stands at 62.
What impact are the departures having on VA patient care? The VA mandates a one-hour turnaround time (TAT) for STAT imaging exams.
- But the source claims that TAT has ballooned to as high as 10 hours. “Imagine not getting critical diagnoses for ER patients until 10-12 hours later!” the source said.
The Takeaway
The new revelations suggest that the problems reported at the VA Washington DC Medical Center are actually endemic throughout the VA system. And given the growing gap between VA and private radiologist salaries, they aren’t likely to recede anytime soon, regardless of the agency’s work-from-home policies.
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Connected Imaging. Empowered Flow
Know those rare and indescribable moments at work when distractions melt away? AGFA HealthCare’s Enterprise Imaging Platform is designed to keep you in that hyper-focused state of mind all day long. Learn more about their solutions today.
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Digital Radiography Designed for Freedom
Learn how United Imaging’s new uDR Aurora CX digital radiography system was designed to give you unprecedented freedom in imaging patients thanks to its new advances in computer vision, automation, and AI diagnostics.
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AI Echo in Community Heart Failure Screening
Breathlessness affects 10% of the adult population and can be a symptom of heart failure. Learn how a community-based program in the U.K. is using AI-assisted echocardiography from Us2.ai to achieve guideline-directed diagnostic quality in a community setting.
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- Higher Costs for Physician Self-Referral: Physicians who read their own images are 188% more likely to order imaging, which raises utilization rates and, of course, costs. A Neiman HPI-backed JACR study of 24.2M Medicare visits found providers who referred all imaging to radiologists had lower odds of imaging, ranging from 41% less for ultrasound to 5% less for MRI (CT was no different). Restricting self-referral could cut imaging by 17%, and authors emphasized the need for policies that limit imaging overuse, both for cost savings and patient safety.
- Redlining and Reduced Breast Screening: The racially discriminatory practice of redlining may have been outlawed in 1968, but its detrimental effects on healthcare access continue. A JAMA Network Open study of 1.1k historically redlined residential areas found that people in neighborhoods that received financially restrictive C or D grades were 6% less likely to receive breast screening than individuals in former A-grade tracts. These findings were independent of current screening proximity, neighborhood conditions, or social vulnerability, leading the authors to recommend solutions that address the socioeconomic disparities propelled by redlining.
- The Economics of Breast Screening: In a related study in Academic Radiology, researchers found that women living in more economically disadvantaged neighborhoods had lower mammography screening rates. Among 7.5k women aged 40-85 screened in 2022, those in high-deprivation neighborhoods as measured by the Area Deprivation Index (ADI) had lower screening adherence rates than those in more prosperous areas (66% vs. 76%). Black women and those preferring non-English languages also had lower odds of screening (OR = 0.44 and 0.33, respectively).
- Breast Rad Therapy and Heart Disease: Are women who receive left-sided radiation therapy for breast cancer at higher risk for cardiovascular disease? In a study in JAMA Network Open, South Korean researchers tracked 23.3k women, finding that those who got left-sided radiation therapy had an 11% higher risk of ischemic heart disease than those who received right-sided treatment. But the difference was due to a 37% higher risk among women with three cardiovascular risk factors, with no statistically significant difference among those with 0-2 risk factors.
- CEM Best Strategy for Extremely Dense Breasts: Among screening strategies for women with extremely dense breasts, contrast-enhanced mammography (CEM) was the most cost-effective in a statistical modeling study in The Breast. In a comparison of modalities that included CEM as well as full- and abbreviated-protocol breast MRI (AB-MRI), all improved cancer detection and life-years gained. But CEM alone was more cost-effective compared to AB-MRI (ICER = $15.6k vs. $57.4k), well below the study’s willingness-to-pay threshold of $23.2k per life-year gained.
- Vara Gets CE Nod for Autonomous AI: Is the world ready for AI-based mammography without a radiologist involved? We may soon find out after German AI developer Vara received Europe’s CE mark for use of its breast AI solution to triage normal mammograms without radiologist review. Under the model, autonomous AI interprets exams that are clearly normal, while suspicious exams are sent to radiologists for interpretation. The autonomous AI triage paradigm addresses chronic workforce shortages, but will need buy-in from both patients and physicians to succeed.
- Us2.ai’s Corbotics Collaboration: Us2.ai and Corbotics are collaborating to create an automated workflow for transthoracic echocardiography exams by pairing Us2.ai’s AI echo analysis algorithms with Corbotics’ Bed Based Echo (BBE) autonomous robotic image acquisition technology. The FDA granted BBE Breakthrough Device Designation in June, and when cleared the solution could enable bedside acquisition of echo exams that can then be analyzed with Us2.ai software, giving more patients in resource-challenged areas access to high-quality imaging.
- Imaging Detects ‘Silent Atherosclerosis’: A study presented at ESC 2026 and also published in NEJM used imaging to show how atherosclerosis begins far earlier than when symptoms appear. In the REACT study, Danish researchers scanned 16.8k people aged 18-70 with CT and ultrasound, finding that 57% had atherosclerotic plaques, despite having no symptoms or a previous diagnosis of cardiovascular disease, which the authors called “silent atherosclerosis.” Conventional cardiovascular risk tools also fell short in identifying people at high risk.
- Elucid Raises $55M: Cardiac AI software developer Elucid raised a $55M Series D funding round that brings its total funding to $185M. The company said the funds will be used to commercialize its BioIntegrated FFR-CT solution, currently under FDA 510(k) review, as well as its already-cleared Plaque-IQ plaque analysis application. Elucid plans to offer both solutions as part of a comprehensive clinical platform that helps physicians stratify and manage patients at risk of cardiovascular disease.
- Scan.com’s Massive Funding Round: U.K.-based patient referral service Scan.com is ready to move past the pilot stage in the U.S. The company raised a massive $220M in Series C equity and debt financing to expand the U.S. footprint of its service, based on a portal that clinicians and patients use to schedule imaging exams and view results. The company sees the fragmented U.S. imaging services market as ripe for consolidation and connection through a single API for scheduling and EMR access.
- Median Reviews Eyonis Options: French software developer Median Technologies is reviewing strategic alternatives that could involve separating its iCRO clinical trials division from its eyonis AI unit. Eyonis developed the eyonis LCS AI software for lung cancer screening that achieved a number of milestones this year, including FDA and CE mark authorizations, but these achievements aren’t reflected in Median’s current market valuation. The options could include listing eyonis on a U.S. public market or “other structural, transactional, financing and strategic alternatives.”
- AI Speeds Chest CT Reporting: An AI algorithm from DeepHealth sped up interpretation of lung nodules on chest CT scans in a new study in Radiology. Dutch researchers compared report turnaround times in 19.4k patients before and after deployment of the DeepHealth Lung algorithm. Radiologists using AI had shorter median reporting time (18 vs. 21 minutes), reducing radiologist workload by 15%, equal to a half-time radiologist at their facility. Thoracic radiologists had larger reductions in turnaround times compared to general radiologists (-25% vs. -2.6%).
- PCCT for Breast Treatment Workup: CT isn’t commonly used for breast cancer, mostly due to its radiation dose. But could photon-counting CT (PCCT) be different? In a paper in Radiology, researchers compared PCCT with other modalities for pretreatment planning of 126 women with suspicious lesions. PCCT was more sensitive than mammography for confirmed lesions (65% vs. 21%) and more sensitive than MRI for confirmed nodal metastasis (78% vs. 69%), but missed 44% of microcalcifications. At an effective dose of 6.7 mSv, radiation could still be an issue.
- United’s Wide-Coverage CT Gets CE Mark: United Imaging Healthcare received Europe’s CE mark for uCT SiriuX and uCT SiriuX Ultrix, a pair of new CT scanners based on the company’s twin-ring gantry architecture. The design pairs two 16cm Ultrix detectors with two X-ray tubes for wider anatomical coverage at ultra-high-resolution, and also supports whole-body spectral imaging. The design was the subject of a recent European Radiology paper in which it achieved high temporal resolution without motion artifacts in patients with high and irregular heart rates.
- Drop a Like for Radiologists: The “like” button has made its way from Instagram to radiology reports, and that may be a good thing per a new Academic Radiology study. A small survey of 25 radiologists who had access to a newly added “like” feature for peer reports showed satisfaction on a scale of -2 to 2 was much higher in users (1.45) than non-users (0.64). The authors emphasize that the peer recognition strategy aims to add to peer reviews, not detract from their rigor.
- GE Gets CE Mark for Photon-Counting CT: GE HealthCare will soon be selling its Photonova Spectra photon-counting CT scanner in Europe after receiving the CE mark for the system. Photonova Spectra is based on GE’s Deep Silicon detector technology, with 0.23-second gantry rotation and 80 mm of detector coverage that’s designed to acquire ultra-high-definition spectral images. The authorization comes five months after the scanner secured FDA 510(k) clearance.
- CARPL Partners with GenServe.AI: CARPL.ai partnered with GenServe.AI to add that company’s patient outreach and care delivery applications to CARPL’s platform. The first stages of the partnership will focus on how GenServe’s technology can improve patient care, such as by closing referral gaps, reducing missed appointments, improving exam preparation, and closing the loop on follow-up imaging scans.
- Vexev’s $6M Victory: AI-powered vascular ultrasound could be gaining momentum in the U.S. with Vexev’s new $6M funding round. The funds will be used to commercialize the Australian company’s VxWave robotic tomographic ultrasound platform. This comes on the heels of the CANSCAN trial which showed a 94% success rate for the device’s autonomous scans. Though ABUS systems still dominate the market, Vexev is one of many companies that are targeting other areas of care.
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The Heart of a 30-Year Relationship
Regional Medical Imaging (RMI) has relied on Merge for its enterprise imaging needs for over 30 years. Learn how Merge gives RMI the scalability and flexibility to keep up with growth, while Merge’s cloud solution helps offload strain on the network.
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Reimbursement for AI-Powered CAC Scoring
Medicare reimbursement for AI-powered coronary artery calcium scoring is now available with code G0680. Find out how it can impact your practice – and your patients – in this video interview with Riverain Technologies.
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The Radiology Layer Nobody Talks About
Detection algorithms, generative reporting tools, and worklist triage engines are only as good as the data that reaches them. Kailo Medical’s KailoHub is the connective tissue that sits between everything. Learn how it can benefit you on this page.
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- The Future of Radiology Is Operational Transformation: In this webinar at 12 pm ET on Tuesday, September 29, discover how leading radiology groups are increasing throughput, reducing report turnaround times, improving workload equity, and helping attract and retain radiologists through a new approach to enterprise radiology operations.
- Imaging Tools for Heroes: Radiology departments are currently pushed to their limits by interconnected challenges. Staff shortages and heavy workloads form a vicious circle. Different measures are needed to address these challenges. Intelligent imaging from Siemens Healthineers can be one of them.
- Simplify the Capture of Non-DICOM Video: Altamont Software’s CaptureWare Video automates the capture and conversion of non-DICOM still images and video to DICOM, enabling visible light still images and video to become an easily accessible part of the patient’s clinical record. Learn more on this page.
- Preserve Your Radiography Investment: FutureProof 20 is Philips’ commitment to support their Radiography 7300 C for 20 years, helping you keep the system performing for decades, reducing total cost of ownership over the long run and letting you focus on the patient.
- Making a Difference For Pediatric Patients and Families: A new study published by Stanford Children’s and Duke examined over a year and a half of patient feedback following the implementation of patient-friendly radiology reports from Scanslated. Learn about the positive impact Scanslated can create for your patients today.
- Advancing Enterprise Imaging With IntelePACS: Watch this on-demand webinar to learn how IntelePACS from Intelerad helps radiology groups, hospitals, and health systems simplify imaging workflows through a scalable, enterprise-ready platform.
- A New Resource for Radiology Jobs: Check out the new Job Boards from Medality to gain access to newly posted positions for radiologists, residents, and fellows. If you’re an employer, post your first job for free to reach Medality’s network of over 40,000 monthly users.
- Adding AI Automation to Radiology Reporting: Reporting Pro from DeepHealth is a next-generation AI-powered solution designed to transform the way radiologists generate clinical reports and findings. Discover how it can transform your practice.
- What’s Slowing Down Your Radiologists? Every click has a cost, and hidden inefficiencies steal time and focus from your radiologists every day. Unburden them with modern reporting software that allows them to speak less and say more. Book a demo.
- Next-Generation 1.5T MRI: Echelon Synergy from Fujifilm Healthcare Americas is a powerful and affordable next-generation 1.5T MRI system featuring Synergy DLR deep-learning reconstruction, fast exam times, and patient-friendly design. Discover how it can help you achieve faster workflow and improved image quality.
- Your Most Expensive System May Be PACS: Aging PACS carries costs most budgets never name: maintenance, downtime, and cybersecurity exposure. Mach7’s modernization framework gives imaging and IT leaders six business factors to weigh before an RFP, plus the migration questions to answer first. Read the framework.
- Smoothing the Transition to Radiology Integration: Consolidation among medical imaging providers is creating challenges when it comes to managing and integrating image data from diverse sources. In this edition of The Imaging Wire Show, we discussed how solutions from Enlitic can smooth the transition.
- Unlock Next-Level Diagnostic Possibilities: Photonova Spectra from GE HealthCare is designed to realize the full potential of photon-counting CT in oncology, cardiology, neurology, and more. Learn more about the difference its Deep Silicon technology makes on this page.
- One Viewer for All: Achieve ultrafast image interpretation with greater efficiency and precision with Visage 7 from Visage Imaging. Visage’s one-viewer philosophy enables all end users – from radiologists to clinicians – to access powerful tools based on clinical need.
- The Modern Way to Send and Receive Medical Images: Medicom Connect enables you to automate clinical image exchange across your healthcare ecosystem with workflows that automatically find, retrieve, and deliver images directly to the point of care, improving access and care coordination. Learn more about Medicom’s solutions today.
- Tackling Radiology’s Capacity Issue: Healthcare providers are under pressure from rising costs, care delays, and growing cybersecurity risks. Watch this video to discover how Mosaic Clinical Technologies delivers a future-ready imaging solution that improves continuity of care and accelerates detection for faster, more appropriate interventions.
- Leadership in Life Sciences: Quibim is committed to accelerating its development within the life sciences sector and strengthening collaborations with leading pharmaceutical companies. Learn about recent leadership developments that are moving the company forward.
- Rapid AI Deployment in Emergency Care: University Hospitals used CARPL to deploy AZmed’s fracture detection tool directly in the emergency department, reducing interpretation time by 30% without disrupting workflows. Learn how UH accelerated AI deployment.
- The Path to Digital Pathology: Hospital for Special Surgery in New York City had a vision: digital pathology coupled with fully integrated radiology, all in one enterprise imaging system. Learn how they turned this vision into reality on this page from Sectra.
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