A group of healthcare providers, technology companies, and diagnostic imaging organizations has joined forces to form the Imaging e-ordering Coalition. The coalition’s mission is to advance the use of electronic decision-support technologies that will guide clinicians in ordering diagnostic imaging tests. It also seeks to educate policy makers and healthcare providers about the patient-centered efficiencies of e-ordering and to recommend to lawmakers that they include e-ordering along with e-prescribing in developing incentives for making the healthcare system more efficient.
According to the coalition, e-ordering prevents some of the issues associated with a radiology benefit manager (RBM) model, in which healthcare insurers employ organizations to manage utilization and costs of certain diagnostic exams. Issues associated with RBMs include regulatory oversight and the burden of physicians having to seek approval before ordering an imaging service. The prior-authorization requirement often denies patients the imaging studies their physicians believe are warranted. Patients are then steered toward lower-precision tests or they are forced to wait days or weeks to receive imaging services, says the coalition. E-ordering provides physicians with real-time electronic access to decisions that are linked to published, evidence-based clinical studies and are tailored to a patient’s specific circumstances.
Members of the coalition include the American College of Radiology, Center for Diagnostic Imaging, GE Healthcare, Medicalis, Merge Healthcare, and Nuance Communications, Inc.
Read the press release.
