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Accident and Emergency and General Practitioner plain radiograph reporting by radiographers and radiologists: a quasi-randomized controlled trial

¹ Department of Health Sciences, University of York, York YO1 5DD, ² X-ray Department, York District Hospital, Wiggington Road, York YO30 8HE, ³ X-ray Department, King's Lynn and Wisbech Hospitals NHS Trust, The Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Gayton Road, Norfolk PE30 4ET, and ⁴ Department of Radiography and Imaging Sciences, St Martin's College, Bowerham Road, Lancaster LA1 3JD, UK

Two specially trained radiographers at York District Hospital have been reporting appendicular plain radiograph X-ray examinations for Accident and Emergency (A&E) patients since February 1995. This study explores the potential for further expanding their reporting role. This was achieved by assessing the two radiographers' and a group of consultant radiologists' ability to report on a retrospectively selected random stratified sample of 400 A&E and General Practitioner (GP) plain radiograph X-ray examinations for all body areas. Using receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve analyses there was no statistically significant difference at the 5% level between the area under the ROC curves for the radiographers and consultant radiologists when reporting A&E or GP plain radiographs. It may be feasible to expand the reporting role of suitably trained radiographers to include plain radiograph X-ray examinations for all A&E patients and for GP patients, with no detriment to the quality of reports.