In a recent meta-study of 440 randomly selected medical imaging studies published in 2019, authors Thomas C. Kwee and Robert M. Kwee found their preponderance to benefit patient care. Of those, roughly 48% were found to increase the “workload of diagnostic radiologists (i.e., number of examinations performed per time unit)”, while roughly 4% decreased their workload.

Key Findings

• “In an academic tertiary care center, 65.0% of recently published medical imaging studies could directly contribute to patient care, of which 48.3% would increase and 4.5% would decrease workload.”
• “In a non-academic general teaching hospital, 63.0% of recently published medical imaging studies could directly contribute to patient care, of which 48.7% would increase and 4.3% would decrease workload.”
• “Interstingly, studies with AI as primary research area were significantly associated with an increased workload; > 86% of AI studies increased workload, of which the far majority [were] due to an increase in both post-processing and interpretation time.”

Access the complete open-source article—

Kwee, T.C., Kwee, R.M. Workload of diagnostic radiologists in the foreseeable future based on recent scientific advances: growth expectations and role of artificial intelligence. Insights Imaging 12, 88 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1186/s13244-021-01031-4