Dear AuntMinnie Member,
A new report released this week on healthcare utilization at private insurance companies confirms what most folks in radiology already know -- imaging utilization is slipping in the U.S.
The recently formed Health Care Cost Institute (HCCI) claims that its new report is one of the first surveys to analyze healthcare utilization at private payors. It offers a look at healthcare spending beyond the oft-cited Medicare data that inform much of the debate over rising medical costs.
For radiology, it's not a pretty picture. HCCI found that radiology utilization dropped by 5.4% in 2010 at the three large payors covered by the survey. In the meantime, utilization grew among all other medical services.
Radiology posted declines in other areas as well, such as outpatient procedure volume and price per professional procedure. The only area of growth for radiology was in price per outpatient procedure.
Proponents of medical imaging have seized on the report as a sign that reimbursement cuts to radiology services have now reached the bone, and further reductions will impede needed access to imaging exams. Learn more about the survey by clicking here.
CT lung screening gets boost -- or does it?
With the HCCI report fresh off the presses, radiology could use some good news -- and what better place for it than CT lung screening?
Well, not so fast. A new set of guidelines issued this week supports the use of CT lung screening for high-risk smokers, but lung cancer advocates are already criticizing the guidance as being too conservative.
The American College of Chest Physicians led a group of societies that released the guidelines on Sunday at the American Thoracic Society meeting in San Francisco. The guidelines call for screening current and former smokers between the ages of 55 and 74 who have smoked for 30 pack-years or more. The evidence is too weak to support a broader screening recommendation, the group said.
But backers of CT screening believe that the guidelines could lead to many individuals who would benefit from CT lung screening not getting the scans. Read about the guidelines by clicking here, and click here for a response from lung cancer advocacy group Lung Cancer Alliance.
What remains to be seen is how the guidelines will affect the movement to secure Medicare and private-payor reimbursement for CT lung screening. Moves are already afoot, and keep watch in our CT Digital Community at ct.auntminnie.com for the latest news.
