Introducing clinical audit schemes and DOSE optimization in radiology in Moscow

Clinical auditing in radiology is not yet a regular practice in Russia, however in Europe this is rising in importance: instances such as The European Society of Radiology (ESR), the European Commission and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) all agree on the increasing necessity of clinical audits. From February 2018 onwards, even the European Union will oblige clinical auditing in radiology departments. The Moscow MedRadiology Center decided to take action for Russia. Qaelum also introduced an application for dose, patient safety and workflow optimization, which is an important part of the clinical audit as well.

Clinical auditing requires guidelines developed by official instances: in Europe, clinical audit schemes like the Quality Assurance Audit for Diagnostic Radiology – QUAADRIL - from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) advise on standards and processes used for comprehensive clinical audits. As no such guidelines are available in Russia yet, the Moscow MedRadiology Center concluded to set up a standard clinical audit scheme and sought cooperation of Qaelum experts.

Dr. Jan Schillebeeckx and Evguenia Boldyréva, experts in clinical auditing from Qaelum, traveled to Russia to meet Sergey Morozov, CEO of the Research and Practice Center of Medical Radiology, Moscow and Julya Zuenkova, Vice-principal on medical affairs and their colleagues. Dr. Schillebeeckx and Evguenia performed a clinical audit in two radiology departments in Moscow based on European standards to cooperate in the development of the auditing schemes in Russia.

The Qaelum audit team On Site

Dr. Jan Schillebeeckx and Evgenia Boldyréva from Qaelum regularly assist radiology departments with the preparation for audits and therefore visited Moscow one week ago. They reviewed systematically all medical radiological procedures by evaluating the current status of the radiology department with respect to its healthcare services. Also areas for future improvement were identified. Our team is extremely well trained to deliver quick and efficient results, thanks to our software. Our presence was very limited to only one day for both hospitals, with both reports delivered immediately the following day. 

The result of the audit provided the Medradiology Center with immediate feedback on their processes with points of attention and had overall positive results. The Qaelum auditors highly evaluated the competence and knowledge of the Russian radiologists and radiographers, but emphasized the importance of process reglementation.
This validates the efforts already taken by the Center in the light of patient safety and quality.

In addition, the Qaelum radiation dose solution DOSE was installed in collaboration with our AGFA-partner, which is the first installation for Qaelum in Russia. Evguenia provided the users in the department with an onsite training of the solution showing them how radiology departments can provide high-quality radiology services and promote continual quality improvement concerning patient dosimetry, in line with European standards and directives.

The collaboration of Qaelum and the Moscow MedRadiology Center was very instructive and both parties are looking forward to future collaborations.