From the October 2015 issue of HealthCare Business News magazine

 
A facility might consider a product such as Z-Dose if it can’t get a free upgrade from the OEM because it doesn’t have a service contract, or if it can’t afford a new CT. “The health care providers who need to be compliant with XR-29, I don’t think they have the capital to spend the serious dollars that the OEMs are asking for,” Ghaza says. “If they’re going to upgrade partially, they would pay five times what they would pay us.”
 


Hayes, of MITA, says providers who still have questions should work with their equipment vendors. “Our mantra has always been to work with the OEMs,” Hayes says. “That manufacturer is going to be best able to determine if your machine is compliant.” There are still unknowns about how XR- 29 is going to be implemented by CMS, says Priscilla Butler, senior director and medical physicist for quality and safety with the ACR.
 



 “When billing people submit the information to CMS, there currently is no indication of what [machine] the scan was performed on,” Butler says. “Most of the billing is done via software. There’s potentially some complex coding involved.” Christenson, of Philips, says manufacturers have been in touch with CMS to discuss compliance with the MITA standards. As part of that process, manufacturers including Philips have also made efforts to better educate their customers on what it truly means to be compliant, as many are confused by the nuances of the standards and what it means for their business, Christenson says. “We’ve worked with CMS to say, ‘This is how a CT is compliant by these standards, and this is how you can verify whether or not your solutions are certified during audit cycles,’ ” Christenson says.
 
Nicholson, of Toshiba, says manufacturers assume that the Joint Commission will also ask to see the certificates during inspections, similar to when they ask to see proof of a scanner’s ACR accreditation. Medic Vision, which offers software called SafeCT, which improves image quality from lower-dose CT scans, is seeking FDA approval for a new product called SafeCT-29. Medic Vision Chief Executive Officer Eyal Aharon says SafeCT-29 will provide a DICOM Radiation Dose Structured Report and CT Dose Check on scanners that are already equipped with automatic exposure control and pediatric and adult reference protocols. Aharon says that according to the CMS proposed rule on XR-29, verification of compliance shall be performed as part of the periodic CT accreditation.

October 2015 Magazine

Read more stories from the October 2015 issue

More Industry Reports