Radiology by nonradiologists: is report documentation adequate?

OBJECTIVE To determine if the quality of medical imaging reports differs significantly between radiologists and nonradiologists. STUDY DESIGN A retrospective nonblinded review of randomly selected chest and long bone x-ray reports by orthopedists and primary care physicians compared with randomly selected imaging reports generated by radiologists. METHODS We randomly selected 1 report from each of 50 high self-referring physicians privileged by 2 metropolitan New York area health plans for both bone and joint studies and chest x-rays for a total of 200 reports (50 bone and joint x-rays from each plan and 50 chest x-rays from each plan). We compared them with 50 randomly selected radiologist-generated reports. The reports were evaluated for quality based on the American College of Radiology's Guideline for Communication: Diagnostic Radiology. The data were analyzed by the 2-sample t-test between proportions at the 95% confidence interval. RESULTS Radiologists consistently provided higher-quality medical imaging reports than nonradiologists. CONCLUSIONS To improve imaging service quality, all providers should be held to the same standards for reporting and communication of results.