Bialogics deploys analytics at large US practice

AURORA, Ont. – Radiology Imaging Associates (RIA) of Englewood, Colorado, a radiology practice with 125 physicians performing more than 1.5 million exams per year at 60 locations across Colorado, Nebraska, Oklahoma, Kansas and Hawaii, has acquired Bialogics Analytics Inc.’s DImax solution to optimize diagnostic imaging workflow and quality control reporting.

Bialogics’ unique, vendor-agnostic solution provides RIA with advanced analytics by incorporating data from multiple sources into one comprehensive reporting system.

RIA traditionally relied solely on data from its financial system to ensure the right number of radiologists by sub-specialty to meet service level agreements with the hospitals and clinics it serves.

However, the acquisition of the Bialogics’ DImax solution provides RIA with a timelier and much more accurate workflow analysis by incorporating data from all RIS/PACS systems, as well as from its Physician scheduling software, Peer Review and Sub-Specialty applications and Reading Value Unit lookup tables.

It also uses a natural language processing engine to extract data from radiologist reports and process nonstructured textual data into searchable structured data elements.

“The efficient management of our practice requires us to know the number of cases coming in and our capacity to read them,” explained RIA president Dr. Brendan Essary. “That’s more complicated than it sounds because we’re a sub-specialty practice providing 24/7 coverage over a large geographical region. The Bialogics Dimax solution can tell us, for example, if we need to add a slot on the weekend from noon to 7 p.m. It identifies bottlenecks, highlights opportunities to boost productivity, and allows us to tweak our scheduling software.”

Analyzing radiologist productivity based on the volume of studies and turnaround times alone can be deceiving because it doesn’t take into consideration a venue such as a hospital’s busy DI department, where interruptions are common.

“One radiologist may read a lot less than another radiologist but is in a slot that isn’t productive,” said Dr. Essary. “By accessing data from our scheduling software, Bialogics gives us a more accurate workflow analysis that includes the productivity of both the slot and the radiologist.”

The Bialogics DImax solution also provides RIA with comprehensive quality assurance metrics on critical results reporting, follow-up studies, and turnaround times that it’s able to share with its customers.

“It’s great to sit down with a CEO and tell him we’re quality-focused, but if you don’t have any data or any specifics, what’s the point?” asked Dr. Essary. “At quarterly meetings with our clients, we go over critical results reporting, turnaround times, and a total of some 20 metrics to present a data-driven review of our performance.”

The quality assurance data on critical results reporting, for example, uses the natural language processing engine to confirm prompt communication of the result to an attending physician.

“We can track performance from the moment a patient requisition has been entered into the RIS,” said Bialogics president Jeff Vachon (pictured). “Every single message and procedural step is tracked across the radiology workflow, so we know how long the patient waited, who the tech was, their prep time, their scan time, the radiologist’s turnaround time, etc.

“If there’s a two-minute delay that can impact service-level agreements and penalize a radiation practice, that’s meaningful information our customers can use to optimize productivity and improve patient access to diagnostic imaging.”

The system can also be used to simplify cohort identification and accelerate data collection and correlation for research across clinical systems, specialties, and patient populations for research projects and AI analysis.

About Bialogics Analytics Inc.
Bialogics is a leader in the precision analysis of diagnostic imaging data and patient workflows, creating a real-time ecosystem for driving the accelerated use of clinical and operational data to improve business performance and clinical outcomes. Bialogics was established in 2016 and has customers in Canada, the United States, and Australia. Learn more about Bialogics Analytics at bialogics.com.

About Radiology Imaging Associates
Radiology Imaging Associates of Englewood, Colorado, is a radiology practice encompassing 125 radiologists who perform more than 1.5 million studies per year for some 60 clinics and hospitals across Colorado, Nebraska, Oklahoma, Kansas, and Hawaii. Most of its radiologists are fellowship-trained in their fields of specialty. RIA is dedicated to accurate and efficient patient diagnosis and its interventional radiologists perform some of the most leading-edge treatments available today. For more information, visit riaco.com.