Stimulus Opps More Ephemeral Than Monetary

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7 PM: A morning session on Economic Stimulus Package Funding Opportunities may have disappointed those looking for hard and fast guidance on how to pay for imaging informatics with some of the $19.2 billion allocated for EMRs. No fault, of course, of presenters Bradley J. Erickson, MD, PhD, Mayo Clinic, Rochester, David S. Mendelson, MD the Mount Sinai Medical Center, and Eliot Siegel, MD, University of Maryland and the VA Maryland Health Care System. The details are still vague.

But the session began to build a scaffold around how radiology may fit into the bigger picture. Meaningful use is a key qualifier to receive stimulus funds, but like a 1950s TV, the picture will take a long time to emerge: the deadline for the definition is December 2009. Now is the time to take that leap of faith, and brainstorm a better, more interoperable future through imaging informatics.

With 83% of the funds unspecified—meaning the field is wide open to anyone who can justify their informatics project—Erickson, who has read the entire bill, believes that CPOE is probably an element of meaningful use, but he could find no mention of RIS, PACS, or CAD in the wording of the bill. “But I don’t know if that means anything,” he said.

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Northern Exposures

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Over a sandwich on the exhibit hall floor and a white chocolate chip cookie the size of my head, I had an interesting conversation about national health IT initiatives with a radiologist attending from Hamilton in Ontario, Canada, David A. Koff, MD. What is interesting are the parallels between the Canadian and the US efforts to built a functional national EMR. The level of financing and its source are very much the same. Canada is spending about $2 billion on its effort, the Canada Health Infoway, and the US, with about 10 times the population, has allocated close to $20 billion in the stimulus package. Both efforts are government financed.

The big difference is that Canada has expressly reserved about $400 million, almost a quarter of the total, to build a nationwide Digital Image Repository that will hold images and reports. Part of that funding will also go towards financing up to 50% of a PACS purchase for a hospital that requires one. The DIR will be composed of 18 or 19 storage vaults and will contain images and reports for the life of the patient. Most provinces have anointed a preferred PACS vendor.

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Leaving Charlotte (Congress, Are You Listening?)

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I left the meeting wishing I had arranged to fly out after the last session rather than before. I also left with a deepened respect for the remarkable work being done by imaging informaticists, and a sense of anticipation about what is to come. Let’s face it: it takes more than software and hardware to ensure digital communications. It takes experienced, innovative IT people who can adapt these tools to individual workflows. And then keep adapting. And adapting. And adapting some more. The job is never done.

Imagine what could happen if Congress deputized these people and this industry with the promise of some stimulus funding.

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Open Source: Free, But Not Always Easy

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There are two reasons to seek out open source software, said Jim Whitfill, MD, CIO at Scottsdale Medical Imaging Ltd: access to code and the fun fact that it’s free. This makes the tools particularly attractive to practices operating in the outpatient environment.

Whitfill moderated a session on PACS workflow and IT infrastructure in the imaging center environment, during which the presenters offered much evidence of the innovation and surprising achievements of small groups of imaging informatics professionals in the employ of private practices.

“We often have limited capital with R & D budgets, so if we want to play around, open source is a great way to investigate new technologies with a low cost,” he said. “As CIO, one of the things I like to do is see what’s going on in other industries, and see if they can work for us.”

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Paradox and imperatives in health care

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Intrigued by Dr. Bauer’s words earlier today? So was I. That’s why I decided to drop in on his afternoon session, “Paradox and Imperatives in Health Care: Effectiveness, Efficiency and e-Transformation.”

Bauer dropped more than a couple of jaws in this morning’s general session when he forecasted a slim 30% chance that some form of health care reform legislation will pass. Those jaws were dragging on the floor when he suggested that radiology, already a beleaguered sector of medicine by anyone’s standards, needs to take the initiative in enacting measures that will improve efficiency and quality of care.

So: how does he imagine the grassroots revolution playing out? What can we do?

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Toward Quantitative Imaging: A Tour of the Reading Room of the Future

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A new feature at this year’s RSNA, the Radiology Reading Room of the Future incorporates 15 displays from leading academic institutions and vendors showcasing the potential—and power—of quantitative imaging. Our gallery of the Reading Room takes you inside the Lakeside Learning Center so you can see all the action!

 

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Leveraging Health IT to Improve Quality and Safety

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“You can’t improve what you can’t measure.” Boy, if I had a nickel for every time I’ve heard that phrase in the past four days . . . well, I wouldn’t be a rich woman, yet, but I would have a pocketful of change. But what does that phrase mean for health IT? In two short words: data mining. The importance of that capability, as well as several others, was the focus of this morning’s session on next generation IT requirements for improving quality and safety.

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