UK's NHS spent $150M outsourcing imaging scans to manage radiologist shortage
Last year, the NHS spent $150 million outsourcing patient scans to cope with the radiologist shortage, according to a 2017 clinical radiology U.K. workforce census report released Wednesday, Sept. 5, by the Royal College of Radiologists (RCR).
Outsourcing costs have more than doubled in the last three years, according to the report, and the U.K. is predicted to be short of at least 1,600 diagnostic radiologists by 2022. In the report, the RCR advised the NHS to hire at least 1,004 more radiologists to keep up with scanning demands.
“The scale of the crisis in radiologist staffing cannot be overstated. Diagnostic and interventional radiology is fundamental to so much of the NHS—from getting a proper diagnosis to planning surgery to cancer care and trauma management,” RCR President Nicola Strickland, MD, said in an RCR prepared statement. “The fabric of medical and surgical care will collapse unless more is done to increase the number of home-grown radiologists.”
The report also found that the number of full-time radiologists in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland flatlined between 2012 to 2017. Additionally, England alone has seen a 15 percent increase in the number of full-time radiologists between 2012 and 2017 though scan workload has also risen by 30 percent.
Strickland believes that scan outsourcing is not a sustainable practice, according to an RCR press release, and explained that international recruitment of radiologists is not the answer to cope with the radiologist shortage.
“The obvious long-term, sustainable solution to our staffing crisis is to fund more trainee radiologists to become our future consultant workforce,” Stickland said.
See here for the RCR’s entire report.
A recent graduate from Dominican University (IL) with a bachelor’s in journalism, Melissa joined TriMed’s Chicago team in 2017 covering all aspects of health imaging. She’s a fan of singing and playing guitar, elephants, a good cup of tea, and her golden retriever Cooper.