The Industrial-strength Imaging Executive
by Curtis Kauffman-Pickelle
Today’s medical-imaging profession is definitely not for the fragile and weak-kneed among our colleagues. It is becoming increasingly clear that navigating the constant changes and challenges that face the practice of radiology today will be the ultimate test of tenacity, perseverance, and creativity. We’re in the playoffs now, and the game is moving to the big-time arena—where the margin for error is nil.
Finger in the Wind
by Cheryl Proval
Physicians are in a real bind as fee-for-service reimbursement falls under attack and alternative payment methods (such as bundling and capitation) gain traction in Washington, DC. As of June 18, Medicare Part B claims were being processed with the 21.3% cut mandated by the sustainable growth rate’s formula, and House Democrats demanded legislation on jobs before they would pass the Senate bill to reverse the cut.
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We provide strategic business and marketing expertise to assist in the growth of your medical imaging enterprise.
Our clients include radiology practices, imaging centers, and hospitals in large and small markets across the country.
Save the Date:
July 20, 2010 11am ESTTopic
Keep Your Hospital Relationships Healthy: Strategies for Every Practice
Presenters:
Randy Roat, CHBME, VP of Radiology, MMP, and George Ehrhardt, CPA, Director, Practice Management, MMP
Medical Management Professionals, Inc.
Topic
RIS to the Rescue | Strategies for Driving Revenue, Productivity and Profitability
Sectra
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Advanced Visualization | Next-generation Architectures
Visage Imaging
Setting Up a CCTA Service
Your hospital just installed a new multidetector CT (MDCT) scanner of 64 slices or more, and your emergency-department physicians are clamoring for a 24/7 coronary CT angiography (CCTA) service; now what?
The Road to Acceptance: CCTA for Chest Pain in the ED
The case for coronary CT angiography in the emergency department grows stronger every day, offering radiology practices that can deliver 24/7 interpretations a foothold in the exclusive field of cardiac imaging.
Innovation From the Outside In: Olivia Ho Cheng, CEO of Aurora
Olivia Ho Cheng, CEO of Aurora Imaging Technology Inc, North Andover, Massachusetts, was recently appointed to the international advisory board for the Britton Chance Center for Biomedical Photonics (BC CBMP).
The Cosmetic Frontier: BOTOX and Beyond
According to data¹ from the American Society for Aesthetic Plastic Surgery (ASAPS), the number of cosmetic procedures performed in the United States has spiked in the past decade; ASAPS estimates that injections of botulinum toxin A (BOTOX®, Allergan, Inc, Irvine, California) increased by over 3,000% between 1997 and 2003, while collagen injections increased by a more modest 79%.
Building an Efficient, Effective Women’s Imaging Service
In a niche notorious for its comparatively low reimbursement, every step along the care continuum must be patient focused…
Radisphere National Radiology Group Launches
To further its aim of extending subspecialty radiology services to community hospitals, Franklin & Seidelmann Subspecialty Radiology, Beachwood, Ohio, recently announced the creation of a new company called Radisphere National Radiology Group
From Here to Eternity: Extending the Franchise Through Distributed-reading Solutions
Few developments in radiology have been more productive (or disruptive) than the advent of PACS. To PACS, radiology owes its ability to increase productivity dramatically during the past 10 years, thereby conserving income levels at a time of diminishing reimbursement.
Automating Management of Critical Results
When Jane Wheatley, CEO of Taylor Regional Hospital, Campbellsville, Kentucky, needed to make a decision regarding her facility’s handling of radiology services
JAMA Article Slams Mammography: At What Cost?
When JAMA published an opinion piece1 in October 2009 questioning the effectiveness of mammography screening and calling for new screening protocols to separate life-threatening cancers from less harmful lesions, the mammography community reacted with alarm.
24/7 Coverage: The New Norm
Teleradiology has reshaped the delivery of imaging services across the board, but it has had a particularly strong impact on around-the-clock coverage.
Contract Research Organizations: Radiology’s Newest Revenue Stream
Pharmaceutical and device makers’ use of imaging for research is providing a new outlet for radiologists’ services.
The Reality of Digital Mammography: How Digital Are You?
Digital mammograms are now being delivered at more than 50% of the mammography sites in the nation.
The ASTRO Survey: Proposed 20% to 30% Cuts Would Devastate Radiation Oncology
Medicare has proposed a 19% overall reimbursement cut for radiation oncology
Vertical Integration of Outpatient Cancer Care
With quality and efficiency driving the trend toward vertically integrated cancer care, outpatient imaging providers must find new ways to integrate into the delivery model or risk being sidelined
Keeping Country Radiology Cool
A rising tide lifts all boats, as the saying goes, and thanks to the hastening deployment of subspecialty teleradiology, some of the smallest imaging-department boats are riding high.
Turf Versus Merit: St. Luke’s Centralizes Breast Care
Hospitals do not cede turf easily to competitors, even within the collegial environment of a multisite system. That, however, is precisely what had to happen before St. Luke’s Hospital and Health Network, Bethlehem, Pa, could centralize breast care among its four hospitals and six outpatient imaging sites in a regional diagnostic breast-imaging center.
Marketing and Wellness Initiatives
Building a profitable breast imaging service entails deploying the right technology for a multimodality approach, effectively triaging high-risk women, and taking great overall care of the CEOs of family health
Premium Ultrasound Dressed Up and Ready for Its Close-up
New applications made possible by improved transducer technology and system software are having an impact on radiologists’ practice patterns
Building a Turnkey Women’s Imaging Service
Building a profitable breast imaging service entails deploying the right technology for a multimodality approach, effectively triaging high-risk women, and taking great overall care of the CEOs of family health
F&S Chair Frank Seidelmann, D.O.: On the Radiologist of the Future
Frank Seidelmann, D.O., is cofounder and chair of Franklin and Seidelmann Subspecialty Radiology, Beachwood, Ohio.
Standardizing Mammographic Workflow and Interpretation
The passage of the Mammography Quality Standards Act of 1992 (MQSA) ushered in a new era in breast imaging.
The CCTA Playbook: A Guide to Coding, Reimbursement, and Operations
A compendium of the business intelligence required to launch a CCTA service
Day for Night, East for West
Teleradiology permeates the specialty as practices cross state, regional, and global boundaries to purchase and practice radiology
CCTA Standards and Turf
Turf questions have always surrounded the provision and interpretation of coronary CT angiography (CCTA) studies.
Adding a CCTA Program: Economic Benefits of Outsourcing
Adding a coronary CT angiography (CCTA) program to your emergency department can help save hundreds of thousands of dollars a year by reducing unnecessary admissions and mitigating the medicolegal expenses resulting from misdiagnoses.
Lossless and Lossy: Study Supports Compression of Mammograms
Compression of images is not an alien concept in radiology.
ACR White Paper: CCTA Structured Reporting
A group of luminary practitioners of coronary CT angiography (CCTA) penned a white paper¹: to guide readers of CCTA in structured reporting for the modality.
CCTA: Radiology Prepares
Though expertise and reimbursement lag, many radiology practices gear up to perform their share of a potential 20 million procedures a year
Detangling Teleradiology in Private Practice
Only a Web-based, thin-client system should be considered by teleradiology providers, according to J. Raymond Geis, MD. It is also vital, Geis says, to make all information available on the Web and to save all data in a searchable form.
Outpatient IR Centers of Excellence: Trends in Practice Expansion
An older medical oncology patient had undergone the paracentesis procedure once before at a hospital.
MQSA: Numerically Speaking
Though the population of women over 40 is on the rise, the number of mammography facilities fully certified in compliance with the provisions of the Mammography Quality Standards Act (MQSA) has declined slightly over the past five years.
The Rise of Vertically Integrated Women’s Imaging
Providing the full continuum of breast care earns the loyalty of the all-important female health care consumer, considerable downstream imaging, and the mammography annuity
Coronary MR Angiography: Can It Compete With Multidetector CT?
Just five years ago, the thought of cardiac cross-sectional imaging turned immediately toward the potential of MRI for evaluation of the heart.
How I Do It: Imaging Pulmonary Hypertension in Pediatric Patients Using CT Angiography
Pulmonary hypertension is a complex process affecting pulmonary and cardiac functions.
The Role of CCTA in Primary Care
Primary care physicians are increasingly referring patients for coronary CT angiography (CCTA) to provide accurate diagnosis of coronary artery disease (CAD) and earlier disease management for their patients.
CCTA: The Road to Acceptance
The advancement of imaging technology is invariably followed by a host of related challenges.
Taking Charge of FFDM Workflow
Radiographic mammography can be difficult to interpret, and radiologists who read mammograms rely on prior studies to guide them.
NightHawk Radiology: Trojan Horse or Saving Grace?
No one has played a greater role in transforming practice patterns in radiology than Paul S. Berger, MD.
Strategic Information-technology Deployment
In my 25 years of information technology management in four completely different industries (distribution, agricultural biotechnology, process manufacturing, and now health care).
Ron Hosenfeld and RivRad: Building an Effective Distributed Reading Solution
The road to a distributed reading model is paved with WAN accelerators, DICOM gateways, and sleepless nights, to hear one practice CIO describe it.
Optimizing Coronary CTA Workflow: How We Do It
Coronary CT angiography (CCTA) provides an accurate evaluation of coronary-artery disease and coronary-artery anomalies, and it gives us the ability to evaluate the cardiac chambers, myocardium, and valves.
UltraClinics: Same-day Cancer Diagnosis in Search of a Market
UltraClinics, Inc, is a company prepared to offer same-day interpretation of breast-biopsy tissue and, if needed, teleoncology consultation for women undergoing breast-cancer screening.
Get Over the Guilt: Leverage Teleradiology to Improve Hospital Service
Teleradiology has come a long way from its origins in the 1980s, when physicians would snap a photo of a film and transmit the image across telephone lines.
CXOFiles No.6 Alliance Imaging’s Paul S. Viviano: Master of Diversification
When Paul S. Viviano, joined Alliance Imaging in January of 2003, the company was almost exclusively a mobile MRI vendor.
Share and Share Alike? Split Interpretations Pose a Challenge to Radiologists.
As if radiologists were not facing sufficient challenges of late, they now are seeing increasing interest from cardiologists seeking to promote the sharing of certain studies.
Breast Imaging Paradox: It’s About the Annuity
In 2002, Norwalk Radiology—like many radiology practices across the nation—reached a crossroads.
CXOFiles No.5 Marinaccio Leads Nassau Group in Latest Growth Spurt
One would think a metropolitan radiology practice that is 100% dependant on the outpatient market for all income would be at a competitive disadvantage in this post-DRA marketplace.
Street Scan: Hologic Buys Cytyc and a Foot in the OB/GYN Door
With its announcement that it would buy Cytyc, Marlborough, Mass, for $6.2 billion, Hologic Inc, Bedford, Mass, broadens its position in the women’s health care market and buys access to its gatekeeper.
Breast MRI: An Imaging Center Opportunity to Raise Bar of Care
New guidelines from the American Cancer Society [1] recommending annual breast MRI for high-risk women are expected to result in significantly expanded demand for the study.
Q & A with Daniel D. Maki, MD: A Very Good Month for Breast MRI
March initiated what could be a sea change in the diagnosis of breast cancer in high-risk women, with results of a breast MR study published in the New England Journal of Medicine and, in the same week, new guidelines issued from the American Cancer Society (ACS) that recommended breast MR as a screening tool for high-risk women.
First, Do No Harm
The past few weeks have witnessed some rather remarkable national press reports about this marvelous profession that is the broad field of diagnostic imaging.
Squeezing Blood from a Turnip
There are several reasons to offer mammography in a freestanding imaging center, although profits are not usually one of them.
