Proving Value in Radiology: Experience Developing and Implementing a Shareable Open Source Registry Platform Driven by Radiology Workflow

Abstract

Numerous initiatives are in place to support value based care in radiology including decision support using appropriateness criteria, quality metrics like radiation dose monitoring, and efforts to improve the quality of the radiology report for consumption by referring providers. These initiatives are largely data driven. Organizations can choose to purchase proprietary registry systems, pay for software as a service solution, or deploy/build their own registry systems. Traditionally, registries are created for a single purpose like radiation dosage or specific disease tracking like diabetes registry. This results in a fragmented view of the patient, and increases overhead to maintain such single purpose registry system by requiring an alternative data entry workflow and additional infrastructure to host and maintain multiple registries for different clinical needs. This complexity is magnified in the health care enterprise whereby radiology systems usually are run parallel to other clinical systems due to the different clinical workflow for radiologists. In the new era of value based care where data needs are increasing with demand for a shorter turnaround time to provide data that can be used for information and decision making, there is a critical gap to develop registries that are more adapt to the radiology workflow with minimal overhead on resources for maintenance and setup. We share our experience of developing and implementing an open source registry system for quality improvement and research in our academic institution that is driven by our radiology workflow.