With demand for imaging on the rise, researchers from St. James’s Hospital in Dublin, evaluated how much the time to completion of imaging examinations can influence patient length of stay and hospital costs. Writing about its findings for Clinical Radiology, the team said it found that delays for patients undergoing MRI, ultrasound and CT inpatient imaging are associated with longer lengths of stay for those patients. In addition, some delays directly lead to increased hospital costs.

The team analyzed more than 25,000 imaging investigations between 2010-2014 at their facility. Longer hospital lengths of stay were connected to delays in imaging, while delays in CT and MRI were connected to increases in hospital costs.

“Put simply, it would appear that a limited radiology service leads to delayed inpatient discharge,” wrote lead author Sean Cournane, PhD, medical physics and bioengineering department, and colleagues. “An extension of radiology availability beyond its currently limited service could contribute to decreased turnaround times in turn reducing hospitalization costs incurred by increased associated lengths of stay.”

“Protest we must”

In a separate commentary, also published in Clinical Radiology, Dr. Paul McCoubrie, department of radiology at Southmead Hospital in Bristol, U.K., wrote that the study by Cournane and colleagues “provides much food for thought.” It led him, he said, to reflect on the situation he was experiencing in the U.K. 

The U.K. needs more radiologists, McCoubrie said, noting statistics from a recent Royal College of Radiologists census. He also noted that radiologists must work toward preventing burnout in this stressful time.

“This paper supports the concept of ‘investing to save’: that is, investment in radiology and radiologists is likely to reap an overall financial benefit for any healthcare system, but it is perhaps unrealistic to expect dramatic increases in funding of NHS radiology services or massive increases in the number of clinical radiologists in training, no matter how loudly we protest,” McCoubrie wrote. “Nevertheless, protest we must, for improving patient care is at the heart of this.”

McCoubrie added that patients who are acutely ill must have imaging services available to them at all times, even with so many areas in need of more radiologists: “This must be available 24 hours a day, seven days a week; however, it may not be affordable or feasible for all hospitals to provide all services at all hours; a degree of centralization may be necessary, say for interventional radiology and 24-hour MRI.”