Guidelines Regarding §16 of the German Transplantation Act – Initial Experiences with Structured Reporting

Abstract

Purpose To transfer the report sheet from the guidelines regarding the German Transplantation Act to a standards-compliant report template and to evaluate it in the clinical routine.

Materials and Methods The template was developed using the freely available software brackets.io. It was implemented in the clinical routine using a reporting platform developed in-house. Interfaces to the department RIS and PACS allowed for integration into the usual reporting workflow. The evaluation period was 70 days.

Results Developing the template for implementation of the guidelines was possible without any difficulties. The content of the report sheet provided in the guidelines was transferred one to one. Additionally, a text field was included to allow for further remarks. In the period under review, 7 radiologists performed 44 evaluations in line with § 16 of the German Transplantation Act. Users of the template, referring physicians and the employees of the transplantation office reported a high degree of satisfaction.

Conclusion Implementing report sheets that are required by law (e. g. in the guidelines regarding § 16 of the German Transplantation Act) in the clinical routine electronically is easy and achieves a high degree of acceptance. The standard supported by the German Radiological Society (IHE – "Management of radiology report templates") allows for a quick response to the growing demand for structured and standardized reporting.

Key Points 

• Report sheets as required by law can easily be incorporated electronically into the clinical routine.

• Templates for structured reporting as supported by the German Radiological Society allow for a quick response to the growing demand for standardized reporting.

• Radiologists as well as referring physicians report a high degree of satisfaction with the electronic version of the report sheet.

Citation Format

• Pinto dos Santos D, Arnhold G, Mildenberger P et al. Guidelines Regarding §16 of the German Transplantation Act – Initial Experiences with Structured Reporting. Fortschr Röntgenstr 2017; 189: 1145 – 1151

Key words

abdomen - CT - health policy and practice - technology assessment - transplantation - MR imaging

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