Joel A. Gross MD, MS, Presenter: Nothing to Disclose

1) Understand the advantages of utilizing outside images for transferred patients. 2) Recognize the challenges in obtaining, processing, loading, and storing these images locally. 3) Recognize the challenges in managing the outside interpretations provided, and/or (re)interpreting the studies locally.

Over the past decade, the number of transferred patients arriving in emergency departments with outside imaging has increased tremendously, due to the relative ease and lowered costs of providing multiple images on small and inexpensive CD/DVDs, or via electronic transfers. This provides a tremendous opportunity to improve patient care, potentially allowing a trauma team to know what injuries the patient has suffered before they arrive, and reducing the added time, radiation, contrast and cost of of re-imaging a patient. Unfortunately, this opportunity also presents with numerous challenges, including: additional time to obtain and process outside images; complexity of reviewing images obtained with different protocols from those used at the reviewer’s institution, incomplete studies, lesser quality studies than those obtained locally. In addition, decisions have to made regarding the processing and interpretation (if any) of these studies.

Gross, J, The Transferred Patient.  Radiological Society of North America 2014 Scientific Assembly and Annual Meeting, - ,Chicago IL. http://archive.rsna.org/2014/14002045.html