• R L Arenson, Y Lu, S C Elliott, C Jovais, and D E Avrin.
• Department of Radiology, University of California, San Francisco 94143-0628, USA.
• Acad Radiol. 2001 Jun 1; 8 (6): 533-40.

Rationale And ObjectivesTo improve understanding of academic radiologists' clinical workloads, the Society of Chairmen of Academic Radiology Departments (SCARD) performed surveys to collect workload data for radiologists in 20 departments; workload was measured in relative value units (RVUs) per full-time equivalent (FTE). Although they were useful for comparisons within some subspecialties, the workload data proved inadequate for comparisons across sections, and adjustment factors were needed for each Current Procedure Terminology (CPT) code.Materials And MethodsAll CPT codes for examinations were divided into groups with similar radiologist work effort. Focusing on radiologists who worked almost exclusively in each group, the authors created adjustment factors by using data from the individual radiologists at each institution.ResultsThe adjustment factors are 0.50 for angiography, 0.58 for computed tomography and magnetic resonance imaging, and 1.0 for nuclear medicine, plain radiography, and special procedures (no adjustment needed for these groups). These factors are multiplied by the work RVUs for each examination to create the adjusted workload RVUs.ConclusionThe SCARD survey provided very useful clinical workload data, with workload measured in work RVUs per FTE for specific subspecialty sections. The new adjusted workload RVUs allow comparison of radiologists' workload across subspecialties.

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