A series of technology-enabled quality improvement initiatives reduced additional imaging recommendations by 44% at Boston-based Brigham and Women’s Hospital, according to a study published June 3 in Radiology.
The interventions were aimed at improving the efficiency and actionability of additional imaging recommendations at Brigham and Women’s Hospital over an eight-year period. Imaging data associated with the interventions was compared to data from Boston-based Massachusetts General Hospital — representing the national standard of practice — for the same time period.
Here are five notes from the study:
- A total of 7,502,521 radiology reports of 1,323,459 patients from January 2015 to December 2022 were included in the study. Of those, 3,608,977 came from Brigham and Women’s — the study site — and 3,893,544 came from Mass General — the control site.
- Interventions implemented at Brigham and Women’s were electronic communication tools for internal use, additional staff to aid in tracking and scheduling follow-up imaging, and performance reports identifying radiologists’ recommendation rates.
- While the interventions were associated with a 44% reduction in additional imaging recommendations at Brigham and Women’s, the recommendation rates at Mass General remained unchanged over the study period.
- Actionability of the recommendations increased from 5.5% to 42.3% at Brigham and Women’s but remained unchanged at Mass General.
More additional imaging recommendations were performed or scheduled at Brigham and Women’s than Mass General, at 84.7% and 59.6%, respectively.
- “This new ‘system of care’ quality initiative is more resilient, helping ensure patients get timely, clinically necessary additional imaging to reduce diagnostic errors and potential harm,” the study authors said in a June 3 news release from Mass General Brigham. “The decreasing rate of imaging recommendations may also help decrease overall health care costs and reduce health risks associated with unnecessary additional imaging, such as radiation exposure.”
Read the full study here.
