Unlike the 20 to 30 minutes required for screening breast ultrasound exams with a handheld technique, automated breast ultrasound (ABUS) studies need only an average of approximately three minutes of physician interpretation time, according to research presented Thursday at the annual American Roentgen Ray Society (ARRS) meeting.
In a quantitative assessment of radiologist interpretation time of ABUS studies, researchers from George Washington University Medical School found that three radiologists took a mean time of 2.9 minutes to read the exams.
ABUS studies are acquired by nonphysician personnel using a specialized scanner, compared with handheld ultrasound; physician time is only required during interpretation. In the George Washington study, 75 sequential ABUS exams that were acquired as part of a multi-institutional trial were read by one of three radiologists with a minimum of two years experience with ABUS.
Mean ABUS reading times:
- Radiologist A: 150 ± 51.8 seconds
- Radiologist B: 234 ±112.5 seconds
- Radiologist C: 136.2 ± 63.3 seconds
Reading times for the three radiologists ranged from 26.47 seconds to 615.4 seconds, with a mean of 173.4 seconds (standard deviation = 90.4 seconds).
Lead author Dr. Rachel Brem and her team said the results suggest that ABUS is a time-efficient technique that can be effectively integrated into the workflow of a busy clinical practice.
