An Audit Of Rejected Repeated X-ray Films As A Quality Assurance Element In A Radiology Department

Abstract

To find out the causes, number, percentage and sizes of rejected radiographic filmswith a view of adopting measures that will reduce the rate and number of rejected films.
Radiology Department of a University Teaching Hospital. Over a two-year period (1 April 2002 to 31 March 2004), the total number of x-ray films utilized for radiographic examinations, rejected films and sizes of rejected films were collected retrospectively from the medical record of radiology department. All the rejected films were viewed by a
radiologist and three radiographers for the causes of the rejects which was arrived at by consensus. The data was analysed. A total of 15,095 filmswere used in the study period and 1, 338 films (8.86%)were rejected orwasted. The rate of rejected films varied from 7.69% to 13.82% with average of 8.86%. The greatest cause of film rejects was radiographers\' faults 547 (40.88%), followed by equipments faults 255 (19.06%), and patients\' faults 250 (18.90%).The highest reject rate (13.82%)was for films used for examination of the spine (15 x 30) cm size. This is followed by 9.92% for skull (18 x 24) cm films and 8.83% for small sized films (24 x 30)cm used for paediatric patients.Of a total of 1,338 rejected films, 1276 (95.37%) additional exposurewere done to obtain the basic desired diagnostic information involving 1151 patients; 885 (76.89%) of these patients needed at least one additional hospital visit to take the repeat exposure.
Rejected films are not billable; patients receive additional radiation and may even come to
hospital in another day for the repeat. Radiographer\'s work is increased as well as that of the support staff. The waiting room may be congested and waiting time increased. The cost of processing chemical and films are increased, thus if work is quantified in monetary terms, the cost of repeats is high. Rejected-repeated film analysis is cheap, simple, practicable, easy to interpret and an effective indictor of quality assurance of radiology departments.

Keywords: Audit, Rejected, Repeated, Wasted, x-ray, Films, Radiography, Radiology, Quality Assurance.

Nigerian Journal of Clinical Practice Vol. 11 (4) 2008: pp. 355-358