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Outsourcer of radiologists files for stock offering

Nighthawk Radiology provides 24-hour coverage to hospitals by placing physicians overseas; its IPO is one of very few for the health sector this year.

By Tyler Chin, amednews staff. Nov. 7, 2005.

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Outsourcing American jobs and services abroad is relatively new to physicians, but Nighthawk Radiology Holdings Inc. is hoping its business of sending jobs overseas leads to a big jackpot.

The Coeur d'Alene, Idaho-based company is planning to raise up to $86.3 million through an initial public offering of common stock, according to an Oct. 5 filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

The company recruits board-certified radiologists who typically are American citizens and then locates them in Sydney, Australia, and Zurich, Switzerland, to provide after-hours interpretation services to American hospitals and radiology groups. Generally, those entities cannot find enough radiologists to provide 24-hour service locally.

As of June 30, Nighthawk had 30 affiliated radiologists providing services to 347 clients serving 693 hospitals in the United States, according to the company's SEC filing.

Nighthawk, founded by radiologist Paul Berger, MD, says it also has contracts with another dozen radiologists. Its radiologists, who are independent contractors as opposed to employees, are licensed in the states where the hospitals for which they provide readings are located. They also have admitting privileges at those facilities, according to Nighthawk's filings.

That appears to meet the guidelines that the American College of Radiology approved for international teleradiology in 2004.

As long as companies comply with its guidelines, ACR doesn't oppose outsourcing, said Arl Van Moore Jr., MD, a Charlotte, N.C., radiologist and ACR vice chair.