Radiography on Wheels

About the project

Transferring older adults residing in long-term care (LTC) facilities to hospitals for diagnostic services is resource intensive, often requiring an ambulance with two paramedics and, if available, a care home staff member. Ambulance transfer can also be frightening, particularly for seniors with a cognitive impairment. Additionally, seniors often have to wait long hours after their appointments to be returned to their nursing or special care homes. To increase access to diagnostic services for seniors in their nursing home, the “Loch Lomond Villa”nursing home led the piloting of the Radiology on Wheels (ROW) project in LTC facilities across Saint John over a period of 11 months (mid-May 2022 until the end of March 2023). If an eligible resident required an X-ray, the service could be offered in the nursing home instead of the hospital.

Conclusions and lessons learned

  • Program data shows that use of the mobile services surpassed anticipated numbers highlighting the demand for patient centered care in the care for seniors.
  • Reductions in wait times facilitated early treatment initiation for patients. This could equally reduce the health care burden of dealing with worsening outcomes due to delays.
  • The reduction in workloads, reported by home care staff highlights the mobile service operational benefits. This could play a role in reducing staff burnout and promoting quality of care for patients.
  • The use of a Steering Committee with diverse backgrounds, such as an ER physician, Radiologist, Extra-Mural Program, family/residents, and others allowed for a robust design and increased advocacy for the program expansion.

Recommendations

  • Implement mandatory EHR training as part of the mobile X-ray service onboarding process to reduce the long waiting periods to receive the X-ray results.
  • Provide registration and ordering privileges to the mobile X-ray team to permit them to request/order tests allowing examinations to be done in a timely manner.
  • Consider extending hours of services to ensure access to care for seniors with sudden needs (i.e. weekends, after work hours).
  • Consider expanding services to capture additional mobile services such as bladder scanners, electrocardiography, ultrasounds, and casting services.

To learn more read the complete project findings (PDF 163 KB)

Knowledge transfer