For hospitals, the top three priorities over the next three years related to the service management of imaging equipment, are to reduce the mean time to repair imaging equipment, manage the service needs for imaging on a 24/7/365 basis and improve the cybersecurity of imaging equipment and networked healthcare information equipment.  

Looking more closely at the importance of cybersecurity in medical imaging device maintenance, 78% of survey respondents indicated they expect the importance of cybersecurity to increase, 19% to stay the same and 3% to decrease in importance in 2024 and beyond, according to the recently published IMV 2023 Diagnostic Imaging Equipment Service Outlook Report

The top two concerns noted by survey respondents regarding cybersecurity are ensuring the privacy of patients protected health information (PHI) and ransomware attacks. These concerns reflect the high importance of protecting the data stored on hospital networks and connected systems, because the consequences of data breaches or data corruption are so high and directly impact patient care and safety. 

According to survey respondents, the hospital IT department is the entity that has the most responsibility for ensuring the cybersecurity of medical imaging devices. 

Looking at service expenditures for diagnostic imaging equipment in 2022, the top modalities covered by service contracts were CT, X-ray, MRI and Ultrasound. Regarding the service provider type, in 2022, 49% of service-related spending was with an OEM, 41% with a third-party provider and 10% outside of contract coverage, such as for time, labor & materials or parts only expenditures. 

Service Provider Percentage of 2022 Service-related Spending 
OEM 49% 
Third-Party 41% 
Outside of Contract 10% 

The top 3 diagnostic imaging service providers in 2022, by share of expenditures were GE, Siemens and Crothall Healthcare. 

Service and maintenance have long been important aspects of managing diagnostic imaging equipment, now with the increase in equipment connectivity and hospital networking, cybersecurity is a new and important aspect of diagnostic imaging equipment management. 

Want to share your knowledge of medical imaging? Click here to sign up for the IMV Survey panel today. 

Davin Korstjens is a Senior Market Research Program Manager at IMV Medical Information Division, part of Science and Medicine Group. 

IMV’s 2023 Diagnostic Imaging Equipment Service Outlook Report explores market trends related to service contracts for diagnostic imaging equipment in U.S. hospitals. The report was published in August 2023 and is based on responses from 292 radiology and biomedical managers and administrators who participated in IMV’s nationwide survey from May 2023 -June 2023. Vendors covered in this report include Agfa, Aramark, BC technical, Canon, Carestream, Crothall Healthcare, Fujifilm, GE, Hologic, Konico Minolta, Philips, Renovo Solutions, Samsung, Shimadzu, Siemens, Sodexo, TriMedx, Unisyn, United Imaging, Ziehm.   

For information about purchasing IMV Market Outlook Reports, visit the corporate website at https://imvinfo.com/ or call 703-778-3080 ext. 1033 to speak with a representative. In addition to the report, all purchases will include a complimentary recording of an executive summary presentation of findings conducted by IMV’s Senior Program Manager. 

Robust ultrasound equipment purchase intent is being driven by the anticipation of shifting procedure volumes to ultrasound from other imaging modalities, according to the recently published IMV 2023 Ultrasound Market Summary Report.  

Looking at purchases planned from 2023-2026, 32% of sites are “planning” to purchase at least one type of ultrasound equipment and an additional 29% of sites are “maybe planning” a purchase. This yields a combined 61% of sites considering an ultrasound equipment purchase in the next several years. 

The top two future outlook factors noted in the survey by ultrasound departments are, “Our current general ultrasound technology meets our clinical and throughput needs”, with 66% of respondents rating 4 or 5 out of 5, and “Our ultrasound procedures are increasing because some procedures are shifting from other imaging modalities”, with 48% of respondents rating a 4 or 5 out of 5. Indicating that the anticipated rise in ultrasound procedure volumes from other modalities is likely contributing to purchase intent. 

The overall number of general ultrasound patient exams was down 2.3% from 38.5 million prior to the pandemic in 2019, to 37.6 million in 2022. 

Among the three types of ultrasound systems specifically, cart-based, tablet/laptop and handheld, 68% of sites have one type, 28% of sites have two types and 4% of sites have all three types in their facility.  

In terms of individual general ultrasound systems, 85% of units owned and managed by radiology departments are cart-based systems, 11% are laptop/tablet systems and 4% are handheld units. For cart-based ultrasound systems GE is present, having at least one unit, at 56% of sites, followed by Philips at 37%, Siemens at 18%, Canon at 15% and Samsung at 5%. 

Inspecting the distribution of exams performed with each ultrasound equipment type, 95% of ultrasound exams are performed with cart-based systems, 5% with laptop/tablet systems and <1% with handheld systems. 

Shifting to ultrasound department operations, as of the 2023 survey, overall there are 4.4 full-time equivalent (FTE) sonographers performing ultrasound exams per site.  

Ultrasound will be an interesting modality to watch to see if the shift in procedure volumes from other modalities continues and to see how the different types of ultrasound systems are utilized in a clinical setting. 

Want to share your knowledge of medical imaging? Click here to sign up for the IMV Survey panel today. 

Davin Korstjens is a Senior Market Research Program Manager at IMV Medical Information Division, part of Science and Medicine Group. 

IMV’s 2023 Ultrasound Market Summary Report explores market trends in U.S. hospitals including department priorities, future outlook, artificial intelligence trends, procedure volume, manufacture-installed base features and share, the use of OEM vs. third-party service providers, purchase plans, brand loyalty, and site operations characteristics. The report was published in July 2023 and is based on responses from 204 radiology/departmental administrators and clinicians who participated in IMV’s nationwide survey from February 2023 -April 2023. Vendors covered in this report include Butterfly Network, Canon, Clarius, Esaote, Fujifilm, GE, Healcerion, Hitachi, Konico Minolta, Mindray, Philips, Samsung, Siemens, and SonoScape.   

For information about purchasing IMV Market Outlook Reports, visit the corporate website at https://imvinfo.com/ or call 703-778-3080 ext. 1033 to speak with a representative. In addition to the report, all purchases will include a complimentary recording of an executive summary presentation of findings conducted by IMV’s Senior Program Manager. 

Disclosure: IMV Medical Information Division is a sister company of AuntMinnie.com. 

Radiation therapy’s growth was mixed in 2022, with treatment visits declining 2.8% year-over-year but the number of treatment courses increasing by 2.9%, according to a new report published by IMV Medical Information Division.  

But these particular data points in the report — called the IMV 2022-2023 Radiation Therapy Market Summary – reflect a gain in the efficiency of treating patients with radiation therapy, in part due as well to a 5.4% decrease in the average number of visits per course of treatment, report lead and IMV senior market research program manager Davin Korstjens said.  

“The reduction in the number of radiation therapy treatment visits needed per course of treatment is a trend that we have seen continue over the past several years and shows meaningful progress toward improving the experience for patients undergoing treatments,” he told AuntMinnie.com. 

The report also found that, although the external beam radiation therapy installed base in the U.S. decreased by 3.3% in 2022, 50% of radiation therapy sites are considering the purchase of an EBRT system in the next three years, Korstjens said. In 2022, 40% of radiation therapy sites reported having brachytherapy units, and 15% of survey participants stated they are considering the purchase of a brachytherapy unit over the next three years.  

Finally, in regards to image-guided radiation therapy equipment, 97% of sites that participated in the survey have this equipment installed, with the top three modalities being CT or cone beam CT, x-ray, and surface guidance radiation therapy.  

“The gains in radiation therapy treatment efficiency seen so far are impressive and it will be interesting to continue to watch this metric to see where the trend will ultimately land,” Korstjens said. 

Want to share your knowledge of medical imaging? Click here to sign up for the IMV Survey panel today. 

Davin Korstjens is a Senior Market Research Program Manager at IMV Medical Information Division, part of Science and Medicine Group. 

IMV’s 2022-2023 Radiation Therapy Market Summary Report explores market trends in U.S. hospitals and imaging centers, including procedure volume, manufacture-installed base features and share, the use of OEM vs. third-party service providers, purchase plans, brand loyalty, and site operations characteristics. The report was published in June 2023 and is based on responses from 312 radiology/departmental administrators and clinicians who participated in IMV’s nationwide survey from August 2021-April 2023. Vendors covered in this report include Accuray, Brainlab, Cerner, Elekta, Epic Varian, Elekta, Gammamed, GEHC, IBA, Nucletron, RaySearch, Siemens, Varian, View Ray, Vision RT and Xoft. 

For information about purchasing IMV Market Outlook Reports, visit the corporate website at https://imvinfo.com/ or call 703-778-3080 ext. 1033 to speak with a representative.  In addition to the report, all purchases will include a complimentary recording of an executive summary presentation of findings conducted by IMV’s Senior Program Manager. 

Disclosure: IMV Medical Information Division is a sister company of AuntMinnie.com. 

March 21, 2023 — PET prostate scan volumes grew 46% year-over-year, showing an increase of 3 percentage points to produce 9% of the overall procedure mix by study type, according to the newly published IMV 2023 PET Market Summary Report.

After a 12.2% increase in overall PET scan volume in 2021, PET scan volume remained flat year over year in 2022. However, the change in volume of PET scans varied by site type, with hospitals with less than 400 beds having a 25% increase in scan volume, nonhospital sites seeing a 10.9% decrease, and hospitals with 400 or more beds remaining flat in 2022.

Looking ahead, 47% of PET imaging sites anticipate their scan volumes will increase over the next 12 months, 44% volumes to stay the same, and 1% anticipate a decrease.

Pertaining to radiopharmaceutical usage, 82% of PET scans used F-18 FDG, 7% used rubidium-82, and all other agents made up the remaining 11%.

In 2022, 30% of sites were considering the purchase of a PET scanner over the next three years, up 2 percentage points from 2021. The percentage of sites planning to have capital budgets for PET equipment in 2023 is expected to decrease 3 percentage points from 2022 levels, to 11% of sites, and then to remain flat in 2024.

Of planned system purchases in 2022, 92% will be equipped with a digital detector. The top OEMs being considered for future PET system purchases are Siemens Healthineers with 64% of mentions, GE HealthCare with 54%, Philips with 8%, Canon Medical Systems with 4%, and United Imaging with 2%.

Regarding patient wait times for nonemergency outpatient PET scans, the overall median wait time is six days, with 29% of sites having a median wait time of less than three days. Independent PET sites have the shortest median wait time of three days, and hospitals with 400 or more beds, hospitals with less than 200 beds, and hospital-owned PET centers have the longest, with a median wait time of seven days.

Want to share your knowledge of medical imaging? Sign up for the IMV Survey panel today.

Davin Korstjens is a senior market research program manager at IMV Medical Information Division, part of Science and Medicine Group.

IMV’s 2023 PET Market Summary Report explores market trends in U.S. hospitals and imaging centers, including procedure volume, manufacture-installed base features and share, the use of OEM vs. third-party service providers, purchase plans, brand loyalty, radiopharmaceutical usage, and site operations characteristics. The report was published in March 2023 and is based on responses from 386 radiology/departmental administrators and clinicians who participated in IMV’s nationwide survey from August 2021-September 2022. Vendors covered in this report include Bracco, Canon, Cardinal Health, GEHC, Jubilant, Philips, Siemens, and SOFIE.

For information about purchasing IMV Market Outlook Reports, visit the corporate website at imvinfo.com or call 703-778-3080 ext. 1033 to speak with a representative. In addition to the report, all purchases will include a complimentary recording of an executive summary presentation of findings conducted by IMV’s Senior Program Manager.

Disclosure: IMV Medical Information Division is a sister company of AuntMinnie.com.

January 19, 2023 — Mammography departments are anticipating that their current budgets will grow by an estimated 9.7% per year from 2023 through 2025, according to IMV Medical Information Division’s 2022 Mammography and Breast Imaging Market Outlook Report.

For the first time in over a decade, IMV has relaunched coverage of mammography and breast imaging in its popular market outlook series. According to IMV’s 2022 survey of mammography departments, the top five priorities of mammography departments are as follows:

  • Improve patient satisfaction with their mammography experience.
  • Obtain/maintain mammography department accreditation.
  • Improve staff satisfaction and morale.
  • Better cancer detection for dense breast screening.
  • Satisfy the needs of referring physicians.

As indicated by respondents, the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on mammography departments peaked in 2020 and is now at the lowest level since that time. The peak impact occurred in 2020 with 87% of departments experiencing a medium or high impact from the pandemic with an average rating of 8.6/10, with 10 being the highest impact. At the time of the survey in the fall of 2022, 21% of sites continued to experience a medium or high impact with an average rating of 4.1/10.

In the 2022 survey, an estimated 91% of 400+ bed hospitals, 64% of nonhospitals, 53% of 200-399 bed hospitals, and 14% of < 200-bed hospitals performed over 6,000 annual mammography procedures per site. In 2022 overall, 25% of mammography procedures were performed for diagnostic purposes and 75% for screening purchases. Mammography-related biopsies are collected at 75% of facilities.

According to the 2022 survey, Hologic has the largest mammography installed base share with 69% followed by GE HealthCare with 20%, Siemens Healthineers with 8%, Fujifilm Healthcare Americas with 1%, and Philips with < 1%.

After a 17% decline in 2022, mammography department budgets are anticipated to grow an estimated 9.7% each year from 2023 through 2025, for sites with a nonzero budget. Regarding mammography system purchase plans, 36% of sites are “Yes, Planning” or “Maybe Planning” to purchase systems over the next three years.

Despite the popularity of the topic, 63% of mammography sites are not currently using artificial intelligence (AI). For sites that are using AI, the most common uses of AI technology in mammography practices are for clinical support to radiologists in diagnostic interpretations, first-pass screening for lesions, to improve image quality output, and workflow optimization.

In 2022, on average mammography sites were open 8.9 hours per weekday and 1.9 hours per weekend. For more details about the current mammography landscape including information about MRI and ultrasound in breast imaging, check out the full report at the link below.

Want to share your knowledge of medical imaging? Sign up for the IMV Survey panel today.

Davin Korstjens is a Senior Market Research Program Manager at IMV Medical Information Division, part of Science and Medicine Group.

IMV’s 2022 Mammography and Breast Imaging Market Outlook Report explores market trends in U.S. hospitals and imaging centers, including procedure volume, manufacture-installed base features and share, the use of OEM vs. third-party service providers, purchase plans, brand loyalty, biopsy modalities and procedures, additional breast care modalities, trending topics in breast imaging and site operations characteristics.

The Mammography and Breast Imaging Market Outlook Report was published in December 2022 and is based on responses from 223 radiology/departmental administrators and clinicians who participated in IMV’s nationwide survey in September-November 2022. Vendors covered in this report include Fujifilm, GE, Hologic, Philips, and Siemens.

For information about purchasing IMV Market Outlook Reports, visit the corporate website at imvinfo.com/ or call 703-778-3080 ext. 1033 to speak with a representative. In addition to the report, all purchases will include a complimentary recording of an executive summary presentation of findings conducted by IMV’s Senior Program Manager.

Disclosure: IMV Medical Information Division is a sister company of AuntMinnie.com.