The Challenges, Opportunities, and Imperative of Structured Reporting in Medical Imaging

Abstract

Despite dramatic innovation in medical imaging and information system technologies, the radiology report has remained stagnant for more than a century. Structured reporting was created in the hopes of addressing well-documented deficiencies in report content and organization but has largely failed in its adoption due to concerns over workflow and productivity. A number of political, economical, and clinical quality-centric initiatives are currently taking place within medicine which will dramatically change the medical landscape including Pay for Performance, Evidence-Based Medicine, and the Physician Quality Reporting Initiative. These will collectively enhance efforts to improve quality in reporting, stimulate new technology development, and counteract the impending threat of commoditization within radiology. Structured reporting offers a number of unique opportunities and advantages over traditional free text reporting and will provide a means for the radiology community to add value to its most important service deliverable the radiology report.

Creation and Implementation of Department-Wide Structured Reports: An Analysis of the Impact on Error Rate in Radiology Reports

“…We believe that every effort should be made to eliminate all error types [10] in order to foster better communication, and therefore better patient care. Like others, we believe the radiology report is the most important basis on which radiologists are judged by referring clinicians and patients [7].…”

“…Proponents of structured reporting tout the many potential benefits including the possibility of decreasing the number of textual errors in final reports [4][5][6][7]. Studies evaluating the ability of structured reports to decrease the number of textual errors have not been performed.…”

PACS Administrators’ and Radiologists’ Perspective on the Importance of Features for PACS Selection

“…Worklist and workflow organization consisted of two level 3 dimensions: integrated with radiology information system (RIS)/RIS and integrated with PACS/PACS [18]. Voice recognition, transcription, and reporting [3] was divided into two level 3 dimensions: auto-transcription [19,20] and self-editing and structured reporting [18,21]. High performance and a good architecture are important for rapidly expanding radiology image volume and corresponding storage organization and fast retrieval speeds [22].…”

The Use of a Hydrogel Matrix as a Cellular Delivery Vehicle in Future Cell-Based Therapies: Biological and Non-Biological Considerations

“…These include the surgeon transplanting the cells, the assisting nurse who prepares the hydrogel and cell mixture, the patient, and the payer. While all stakeholders have a vested interest in the hydrogel matrix improving cellular survival, arguably the most important are the physician and assisting nurse who find convenience of use crucial (Reiner, 2009). Critical variables affecting convenience include speed of hydrogel dissolution in clinically relevant buffers (e.g.…”