What Goes Down In X-Ray: An Analysis Of Making, Reading, And Reporting Films Of 100,000 Patients With Implications For Equipment Design

Karl Thord Dockray

doi:10.1117/12.938177

15 November 1978 What Goes Down In X-Ray: An Analysis Of Making, Reading, And Reporting Films Of 100,000 Patients With Implications For Equipment Design

Karl Thord Dockray

Author Affiliations +

Proceedings Volume 0152, Recent and Future Developments in Medical Imaging I; (1978) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.938177
Event: 22nd Annual Technical Symposium, 1978, San Diego, United States

Abstract

The making and interpretation of radiographs for 100,000 patients was studied so that time parameters could be established that might be of help to x-ray equipment designers. In producing films, it is found that the average patient stays thirty to fifty minutes in an x-ray department for 3.4 exposures. For a single exposure there are twelve steps in the production cycle taking 14.1 minutes. Some speculative tables were drawn suggesting automated equipment and computer-aided devices that might cut production time from twenty to sixty percent. Interpretation of the radiographs by the radiologist indicates that each case takes an average of five minutes. These gross case averages are deceptive. Stop-clock monitoring of all a radiologist's activities indicates that only forty-five percent of his time on the job is truly spent film reading. The remainder is given to consultation with the referring physicians, fluoroscopy, and managing the x-ray department. From this it was inferred that the average x-ray case was processed by the radiologist in two to two-and-one-half minutes, thus establishing a time frame in which any image-assisting device or computer aid must work.

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Karl Thord Dockray "What Goes Down In X-Ray: An Analysis Of Making, Reading, And Reporting Films Of 100,000 Patients With Implications For Equipment Design", Proc. SPIE 0152, Recent and Future Developments in Medical Imaging I, (15 November 1978); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.938177

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