While overall imaging costs are increasing faster than overall Medicare cancer care costs, 18F-FDG PET or PET/CT account for approximately 1.5 percent of Medicare cancer care expenditures, according to an economic analysis published online in a December supplement to the Journal of Nuclear Medicine.
The Health Care Cost Institute (HCCI), a health research initiative led by payors Aetna, Humana, Kaiser Permanente and UnitedHealthcare, was launched to allow researchers and policymakers access to a collection of health plan and government payor data. The HCCI said this initiative will offer new insights into healthcare costs, utilization and intensity, as well as inform the public policy process and assist in developing new solutions to long-term problems confronting the healthcare system.
Self-referring physicians are 2.5 times more likely to order imaging exams on patients than physicians without financial stakes in imaging orders, resulting in an estimated $3.6 billion in additional healthcare costs each year, according to a study published in the July issue of the Journal of the American College of Radiology.
Radiology benefit managers (RBMs) are assuming an increasing role in the utilization of imaging, but as the authorization system makes its way into more hospitals and national healthcare policy, a study published in the June issue of the Journal of the American College of Radiology questions the cost-effectiveness of RBMs and points to substantial cost shifting to providers.
As physicians face tighter scrutiny from consumers and public health experts, a survey conducted by Jackson Healthcare reveals that physician salary accounts for approximately 8 percent of total U.S. spending on medical care, while only a minority of physicians receive additional earnings for ordering imaging or other tests.
Written by Brian Dunham
Vermont Gov. Peter Shumlin May 26 signed into law a bill that will begin a plan for a single-payor universal healthcare system in the state, the first of its kind in the U.S.
Written by Justine Cadet
The private practice of cardiology has been “under assault” since well before the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) due to greater reimbursement cuts in this setting, causing a push toward hospital employment, according to a May 24 editorial in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology. However, author Alexander A. Stratienko, MD, told Cardiovascular Business that the current model of integration should not have to equate to hospital employment.
As the U.S. devotes increasing attention to improving the value of the nation’s healthcare, radiology has relegated itself to the backseat, failing to adequately train its specialists in the subspecialty of health services and thus leading to a clinical and policy space where radiologists are stuck on the outside, watching more versed specialties determine the future of U.S. healthcare, argued the authors of a review article published in the May issue of the American Journal of Roentgenology.
As physicians and policymakers gear up for healthcare reform and the elusive goal of improved outcomes at lower costs, providers and payors are increasingly looking to comparative effectiveness research to guide clinical practice and reimbursements, evidenced by a solid investment on the part of the government, argued the authors of a perspective article in the New England Journal of Medicine.
Radiologists might have brought the commoditization of radiology upon themselves, but the competition that has fueled the phenomenon could also be the approach that decapitates it. Competition could reverse the trend toward commoditization and buttress quality, argued a Masters of Radiology panel in the April issue of the American Journal of Roentgenology.
During a time of tremendous uncertainty in healthcare and monotonously consistent inaccurate predictions about the system’s future and radiology’s role in it, scenario planning offers radiology chairs a complementary approach to improve readiness and maximize the department’s prospective problem solving capabilities, argued the authors of a March study published in the Journal of the American College of Radiology.
Written by Lisa Fratt
The volume of advanced imaging services delivered to Medicare beneficiaries decreased in 2009 for the first time in 11 years, potentially signaling the end of the era of rapid growth in medical imaging volume, according to a study conducted by The Moran Company. The dip in volume could spell reduced access to advanced imaging and may drive healthcare costs higher.
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