Two UC Health emergency departments avoided more than 3,500 unnecessary head and cervical spine CT scans over 23 months with no missed injuries identified, according to a study published in the Western Journal of Emergency Medicine.
The quality improvement campaign ran at University of Cincinnati Medical Center and West Chester Hospital in West Chester Township, Ohio. The campaign paired continuing education on clinical decision rules for head and cervical spine imaging with decision-support software embedded in the EHR, plus quarterly feedback showing physicians how their own ordering compared with peers’. Teams also created patient handouts to reassure those who expected a scan they did not need.
Physician-researchers estimated the effort eliminated 3,542 scans in low-risk trauma patients, avoiding $6.2 million in patient charges at roughly $1,750 per scan and saving 14,168 hours of patient waiting time. The campaign also avoided 6,021.4 millisieverts of radiation exposure — the equivalent of roughly 2,000 years of background radiation for one person.
A safety review identified no patient harm and no missed injuries.
“We do not miss serious injuries if you follow these guidelines,” said David Thompson, MD, director of quality improvement and patient safety in the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine’s department of emergency medicine. “There is no downside.”
View the full study here.
