Image conscious: The growing use of doctor-owned scanning centers

MRIs aren't just for hospitals. Physician groups find value in having their own diagnostic imaging technology.

By Katherine Vogt, AMNews staff. May 17, 2004.

The river of revenue flowing out of physician practices into the coffers of diagnostic imaging centers is prompting some groups to try to build a dam by taking matters into their own hands.

Physician groups, feeling the pinch of declining reimbursements, are increasingly opening their own diagnostic imaging centers so they can hold on to revenue that previously left the practice with patients sent elsewhere for expensive scans and studies.

"It's just addressing the issues of the business of medicine, trying to make ends meet. [Opening our own imaging center] offers us an opportunity to capture that revenue that we were sending somewhere else," said Joseph Cincotta, MD, whose multispecialty group in Lemoyne, Pa., opened an imaging center nearly seven years ago.

Experts say many of these ventures are profitable, though they are not without risk.

The financial commitment necessary to launch a diagnostic imaging center and maintain its equipment can be daunting: into the millions of dollars. Additionally, the legal implications of physicians owning such facilities must be carefully considered to stay clear of laws prohibiting self-referral. And recent reports from the Center for Studying Health System Change and the BlueCross BlueShield Assn. have suggested that insurers are questioning the high costs of imaging services and increasingly taking steps to restrict coverage of them.

But more and more physicians appear to be willing to take on the risks in hopes of benefiting from added revenue as well as from increased access and convenience for themselves and their patients. And with demand for diagnostic imaging services increasing as technology advances, it appears unlikely that the trend will slow any time soon.