J Am Coll Radiol. 2015 Jul;12(7):683-8. doi: 10.1016/j.jacr.2015.03.040. Epub 2015 May 21.
Sokolovskaya E1, Shinde T2, Ruchman RB2, Kwak AJ2, Lu S2, Shariff YK2, Wiggins EF2, Talangbayan L2.
PURPOSE: The purpose of the study was to determine if increasing radiologist reading speed results in more misses and interpretation errors.
METHODS: We selected a sample set of 53 abdomen-pelvis CT scans of variable complexity performed at a teaching hospital during the study period. We classified the CT scans into 4 categories based on their level of difficulty, with level 4 representing the most-complex cases. Five attending radiologists participated in the study. We initially established an average baseline reporting time for each radiologist. Radiologists were randomly assigned a set of 12 studies, of varying complexity, to dictate at their normal speed, and a separate set of 12 studies, of similar complexity, to read at a speed that was twice as fast as their normal speed. The major and minor misses were recorded and analyzed. A χ(2) analysis was used to compare the results.
RESULTS: Reading at the faster speed resulted in more major misses for 4 of the 5 radiologists. The total number of major misses for the 5 radiologists, when they reported at the faster speed, was 16 of 60 reported cases, versus 6 of 60 reported cases at normal speed; P = .032. The average interpretation error rate of major misses among the 5 radiologists reporting at the faster speed was 26.6%, compared with 10% at normal speed.
CONCLUSIONS: Our pilot study found a significant positive correlation between faster reading speed and the number of major misses and interpretation errors. Copyright © 2015 American College of Radiology. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.