Healthcare and its transformation to consumer-driven, value-based practice requires the right specialists at the point of care, minimizing the time between testing and definitive diagnosis. This mandate from patients, physicians and hospitals demands availability of 24/7 subspecialty radiologists," says Bradford Woodall, MD.

Recognizing the opportunity to elevate the level of care for Mercy Health and its patients, the radiologists from Anderson, Clermont, Fairfield and West developed a relationship with Columbus Radiology, a nationally recognized leader in radiology value and innovation. The resulting partnership, Paradigm Radiology, provides Mercy Health with subspecialty trained radiologists 24/7.  Those radiologists are supported by a robust IT infrastructure enabling them to utilize daily tools such as our worklist and voice recognition systems in innovative ways to provide high-quality patient care quickly and efficiently.

"Columbus Radiology had an established, state-of-the-art infrastructure and culture of excellent service," says Kevin Aukerman, MD. "When Mercy announced a competitive bid process, it was an easy choice for us to partner with Columbus Radiology."

In addition to in-house IT and networking staff, Paradigm provides a Results Communication Center as part of its robust infrastructure. Incorporating our Results Communication Center in the Cincinnati market is a key service enhancement.  This enables us to provide access for referring physicians and facilities to the right radiologist 24 hours a day, seven days a week and 365 days a year," says J.D. Keighley, director of operations at Paradigm Radiology.

The Results Communication Center currently handles more than 25,000 calls per month connecting radiologists to referring physicians and delivering clinically significant findings. This bidirectional communication between radiologists and referring physicians is vital to Paradigm adding value beyond the exam interpretation.

From a clinical perspective, the relationship with Mercy Health brings Paradigm Radiology’s subspecialty radiologists to the patients in Cincinnati. Subspecialty practice requires an additional year of focused fellowship on the part of the radiologist. Paradigm’s subspecialists include musculoskeletal radiologists, mammographers, neuroradiologists, body imagers, nuclear medicine fellows and interventional radiologists. 

"The added number of subspecialty radiologist paired with sophisticated infrastructure allows us to ensure subspecialty cases are always read by the appropriate radiologist," says Dan Cassady, MD, quality improvement safety officer for Paradigm. "We could not achieve this level of care independently."

In the past, Cincinnati radiologists would transmit exams to distant third parties for preliminary interpretation and then reinterpret the same exams the next day. "We now measure our turnaround time for results in minutes and interpret all of our studies 24/7 without using an outside teleradiology company," says Dr. Woodall. "This ensures consistent high quality and finalized exams with an extremely efficient turnaround. Now the emergency room physicians have our input on the patient’s care immediately."

"Because of the real-time feedback from Paradigm, we changed our processes. We don’t let patients leave without a final read from the radiologist," says Mike Argus, MD, system director emergency medicine physicians.

In preparation for enhanced services, Mercy Health has invested in interventional radiology across the system, most notably the new intentional radiology suite at Mercy Fairfield. Paradigm Radiology has hired experienced, fellowship trained interventional radiologists Paul Dorio, MD and Lisa Obert, MD to join the existing team of radiologists. This infusion of experience has enabled Paradigm to initiate advanced interventional radiology procedures at all four hospitals including advanced oncology treatments, obstetric embolizations and gastrointestinal intervention.

"We are excited to have the support of the system and the opportunity to improve patient care.," Dr. Dorio, medical director of Interventional Radiology says. "Interventional radiology expands the treatment options available to patients and providers by utilizing imaging guidance to provide minimally invasive treatment. 

The decision to partner and form Paradigm Radiology was not only wise medically, but a sound business decision as well.

"The Cincinnati radiologists have been visionary in bringing increased quality, access and subspecialty expertise to radiology in Cincinnati.  Their recognition of a changing model requires the ability to adapt to a changing healthcare landscape," according to Keighley.

 "We work hard to keep the local feel to our services and preserve the existing relationships built through years of experience in the market," says Kevin Weber, MD. "The people we interact with at the hospital are our neighbors. What we want to do is bring enhanced service to community physicians so they can continue to serve Cincinnati patients."

You can reach Paradigm Radiology at 513.891.7231 or visit their website at www.paradigmradiology.com.