Background/introduction
Justification is one of the fundamental principles of radiation protection.
According to Council Directive 2013/59/Euratom, the Member States shall ensure that referral guidelines for medical imaging, taking into account radiation doses, are available to the referrers and medical practitioners (1).
In 2014 the European Commission published the results of a European-wide survey onReferral Guidelines for Medical Imaging Availability and Use in the European Union(RP 178), with the involvement of the national radiological societies and national competent authorities. This study demonstrated that, although referral guidelines for...
Description of activity and work performed
Methods and materials
33,000 ESR member radiologists from 53 countries were invited to respond to an anonymized web-based multiple-choice questionnaire.
The survey included countries member of the EU and/or the EEA (Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lichtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, United Kingdom), and non EU/EEA countries (Albania, Andorra, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Georgia, Gibraltar, Israel, Kazakhstan, Kosovo, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Monaco,...
Conclusion and recommendations
Just about half of the EU/EEA radiologists were aware that imaging referral guidelines are a legal requirement, despite the Directive 2013/59/Euratom requiring their availability has been transposed in most EU/EEA countries. Less than half of non-EU/EEA radiologists answered that availability of guidelines is a legal requirement in their countries. Not unexpectedly, the adoption of imaging referral guidelines is still largely incomplete in many EU/EEA and non-EU/EEA institutions. This issue is even more evident in children, especially in non-EU/EAA countries.
In EU/EEA countries the source of...
Personal/organisational information
C. Granata, Genoa/IT - paid speaker for Guerbet Italia
G. P. Frija, Paris/FR - nothing to disclose
J. Damilakis, Heraklion/GR - nothing to disclose
T. de Bondt, Antwerp/BE - nothing to disclose
S. Foley, Dublin/IE - nothing to disclose
C. Owens, London/UK - nothing to disclose
References
1.Council Directive 2013/59/EURATOM https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/PDF/?uri=CELEX:32013L0059&from=IT
2.European Commission. Referral Guidelines for Medical Imaging https://ec.europa.eu/energy/sites/ener/files/documents/178.pdf