Health Care Costs & Quality

Overview
Diagnostic medical imaging have revolutionized health care delivery in America.

MITA member companies research, develop and manufacture medical technologies that enable a future of better health outcomes at lower costs.

Integral to Standards of Care
In 2011 alone, an estimated 1.6 million Americans were diagnosed with cancer and malignancies claimed over half a million lives. Statistics like this emphasize how essential access to imaging services is for diagnosing disease early when it is most treatable. Medical imaging also gives physicians the ability to determine if a therapy is working and plays an integral role in therapeutic treatments that offer highly personalized, non-invasive and cost-effective care for 50-60 percent of all diagnosed cancer patients today.

Medical imaging is integral to established medical guidelines. These guidelines reflect clinical recommendations developed by specialty physician groups on how best to diagnose and treat specific medical conditions. They are based upon proven best practices, widely accepted Standards and scientific evidence. Some examples include the following:

• Guidelines by the American Heart Association and the American College of Cardiology recommend use of CT and other imaging technologies to diagnose peripheral arterial disease.

• Guidelines developed by the American Cancer Society, the American Medical Association, the American College of Radiology, the National Cancer Institute and the American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology recommend regular mammograms for woman and regular MR imaging for women in specified high-risk categories.

• Guidelines by the National Comprehensive Cancer Network recommend the most appropriate treatments for various disease sites.

• Guidelines developed by the American Association of Physicists in Medicine define necessary quality assurance measures for intensity modulated radiation therapy to ensure safe and accurate treatment for cancer patients.

• Guidelines by the National Cancer Institute define Standards of care for screening and testing of specific cancers.
• To inform the conversation about balancing the benefits and risks associated with certain types of medical imaging, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) released the Initiative to Reduce Unnecessary Radiation Exposure from Medical Imaging.

Turning Patients into Survivors
In addition to being fundamental to Standards of care, our technologies also help patients avoid or limit more invasive procedures and return to their everyday lives faster. From receiving a CT scan instead of a cardiac catheterization to detecting a polyp before it is cancerous, peer-reviewed research confirms that medical imaging technologies not only improve health outcomes and save lives but also reduce health care costs.

Imaging Saves Health Care Expenditures
Beyond the life-saving impact of medical imaging, researchers have also found that it saves money in the long-run. Every $1 spent on in-patient imaging correlates to approximately $3 in total savings and according to researchers at Harvard Medical School, every $385 spent on imaging decreases a patient’s hospital stay by one day, saving approximately $3,000 per patient.

Other,  disease specific studies have found that increased imaging could save up to $1.2 billion annually in the treatment of stroke patients and since 1998,CT scans  have been found to significantly reduce the negative appendectomy rate and the number of unnecessary hospital admissions, saving $447 per patient.