Research on the impact of xWave's Clinical Decision Support technology on radiology referrals has just been published in one of Europe's leading radiology publications, Insights Into Imaging.
Researchers from St Vincent's Univeristy Hospital collected CT and MRI neck data retrospectively to examine the relationship between imaging referrals pre- and post-implementation of xWave's clinical decision support system (xWave CDS). Effective radiation dose and estimated carbon emissions were also compared.
Here are some of the key results: "There was an overall reduction in absolute advanced imaging volume by 8.2%, and a reduction in duplicate CT and MRI imaging by 61%. There was also a shift in ordering behavior in favor of MRI. These changes resulted in an effective radiation dose reduction of 0.27 mSv per patient, or 13 equivalent chest x-rays saved per patient. Additionally, the reduction in unnecessary duplicate imaging led to a 13.5% reduction in carbon emissions."
The full article can be accessed here: https://insightsimaging.springeropen.com/articles/10.1186/s13244-023-01567-7
xWave Technologies is on a mission to save lives by ensuring that patients get the best test first. The Federal Drug Administration estimates that between 20%-50% of advanced imaging might be unnecessary for patients. This can result in poor patient outcomes, such as missed diagnoses and delayed diagnoses, and can also exacerbate radiology waiting lists and cost health providers significant sums of money. To solve this problem xWave Technologies have developed xWave CDS, a cloud-based clinical decision support system, to support referrers to order the best test first for their patients and to support radiology teams in vetting referrals more efficiently. xWave CDS has been developed in partnership with both the European Society of Radiology (iGuide) and the Royal College of Radiologists (iRefer) to enable referrers to access evidence-based guidelines to order the best test for their patient at the point of care.