Time Requirement And Feasibility Of A Systematic Quality Peer Review Of Reporting In Radiology

Objective To estimate the human resources required for a retrospective quality review of different percentages of all routine diagnostic procedures in the Department of Radiology at Bern University Hospital, Switzerland.Materials and Methods Three board-certified radiologists retrospectively evaluated the quality of the radiological reports of a total of 150 examinations (5 different examination types: abdominal CT, chest CT, mammography, conventional X-ray images and abdominal MRI). Each report was assigned a RADPEER score of 1 to 3 (score 1: concur with previous interpretation; score 2: discrepancy in interpretation/not ordinarily expected to be made; score 3: discrepancy in interpretation/ should be made most of the time). The time (in seconds, s) required for each review was documented and compared. A sensitivity analysis was conducted to calculate the total work-load for reviewing different percentages of the total annual reporting volume of the clinic.Results Among the total of 450 reviews analyzed, 91.1% (410/450) were assigned a score of 1 and 8.9 % (40/450) were assigned scores of 2 or 3. The average time (in seconds) required for a peer review was 60.4s (min. 5s, max. 245s). The reviewer with the greatest clinical experience needed significantly less time for reviewing the reports than the two reviewers with less clinical expertise (p < 0.05). Average review times were longer for discrepant ratings with a score of 2 or 3 (p < 0.05). The total time requirement calculated for reviewing all 5 types of examination for one year would be more than 1200 working hours.Conclusion A retrospective peer review of reports of radiological examinations using the RADPEER system requires considerable human resources. However, to improve quality, it seems feasible to peer review at least a portion of the total yearly reporting volume.