Study Results from Nationwide Children’s Hospital Broaden Understanding of Pediatric Radiology (Advanced Imaging Use and Payment Trends In a Large Pediatric Accountable Care Organization): Medical Imaging – Pediatric Radiology

2021 OCT 12 (NewsRx) -- By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Insurance Daily News -- A new study on Medical Imaging - Pediatric Radiology is now available. According to news reporting from Columbus, Ohio, by NewsRx journalists, research stated, “Pediatric imaging use and payment trends in accountable care organizations (ACOs) are seldom studied but are important for health policy decisions and resource allocation. To evaluate patterns of advanced imaging use and associated payments over a 7-year period at a large ACO in the USA serving a Medicaid population.”

The news correspondents obtained a quote from the research from Nationwide Children’s Hospital, “We reviewed paid claims data from 2011 through 2017 from an ACO, analyzing the MRI, CT and US use trends and payments from emergency department (ED) and outpatient encounters. We defined ‘utilization rate’ as the number of advanced imaging procedures per 100 enrolled children per calendar year. Average yearly utilization and payments trends were analyzed using Pearson correlation. Across 7 years, 186,552 advanced imaging procedures were performed. The average overall utilization rate was 6.99 (95% confidence interval [CI]: 6.9-7.1). In the ED this was 2.7 (95% CI: 2.6-2.8) and in outpatients 4.3 (95% CI: 4.2-4.3). The overall utilization rate grew by 0.7% yearly (P=0.077), with US growing the most at 4.0% annually (P=0.0005), especially in the ED in the US, where it grew 10.8% annually (P=0.000019). The overall payments were stable from 2011 to 2017, with outpatient MRI seeing the largest payment decrease at 1.8% (P=0.24) and ED US showing the most growth at 3.3% (P=0.00016). Head CT and abdominal US were the two most common procedures. Over the study period, advanced imaging utilization at this large pediatric ACO serving the Medicaid population increased, especially with US use in the ED.”

According to the news reporters, the research concluded: “Overall payments related to advanced imaging remained stable over this period.”

This research has been peer-reviewed.

For more information on this research see: Advanced Imaging Use and Payment Trends In a Large Pediatric Accountable Care Organization. Pediatric Radiology, 2021. Pediatric Radiology can be contacted at: Springer, One New York Plaza, Suite 4600, New York, Ny, United States. (Springer - www.springer.com; Pediatric Radiology - http://www.springerlink.com/content/0301-0449/)

Our news journalists report that additional information may be obtained by contacting Ramkumar Krishnamurthy, Nationwide Children’s Hospital, Dept. of Radiology, 700 Childrens Dr, Columbus, OH 43205, United States. Additional authors for this research include Summit H. Shah, Houchun H. Hu, Rajesh Krishnamurthy, Ling Wang, Sean P. Gleeson and Gilbert C. Liu.

The direct object identifier (DOI) for that additional information is: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00247-021-05198-2. This DOI is a link to an online electronic document that is either free or for purchase, and can be your direct source for a journal article and its citation.

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