Did you know that the first airline safety video was produced by Virgin America in 2007? Now these videos are widely accepted, and in time patient information videos may be just as routine, according to Meinrad Beer of the University Hospital Ulm, who presented a study about patient information on CT at the recent European Congress of Radiology in Vienna,

Information provided by radiologists to patients before they undergo a CT scan is time-consuming for the doctors and not satisfactory for patients, according to a study from Beer and colleagues from the University Hospital Ulm, Germany. A survey found that up to 40% of patients said they received no information from a radiologist.  85.3% of the doctors said that medical information was heavily affecting their daily workflow. And there is a cost. If it takes about 5 minutes time to provide the information at about 6.57 Euros, and there are 4.88 million CTs a year equal to 17.7 doctor-years then the annual cost is 33 million Euro. In Germany, 14% of damages in medico-legal cases are associated with a less than optimal medical information process.

Daniela Kildal and colleagues from the University Hospital Ulm developed and evaluated a video about CT scans. The video (20 minutes) included information about the basics and procedure of the CT exam, dose effects, principles, and information about risks and adverse reactions, ending with a summary.

106 doctors and 512 patients answered a survey after reading the current information (8 page leaflet and consultation with the radiologist). 81 of the doctors were radiologists; 60% of them do between 5-35 patient information sessions about CT per day. None of the doctors believed that patients completely understood the information. 62 patients watched the information video and took a survey. The patients were asked what information they could remember, and what information about risk and side effects?

Both doctors and patients liked the idea of CT information being provided by video or computer animation.


Patients recalled much more information after watching the video.


The researchers calculated the potential cost of using patient information videos as 13.2 million Euro a year (4.88 million CTs per year in Germany) savings due to no longer printing information sheets, not needing to use dedicated rooms for information briefings, and reduction in doctor time needed.

The researchers are Daniela Kildal, Stefan A. Schmidt, Meinrad Beer and Tilman Blasenbrey from University Hospital Ulm and Oliver Schöffski from Nürnberg.

Image credit: University Hospital Ulm

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CT, patient information, patient satisfaction, cost-effectiveness, videos, Germany, European Congress of Radiology 2018, Radiation Risks, ECR 2018, #ECR2018, workload Information provided by radiologists to patients before they undergo a CT scan is time-consuming for the doctors and not satisfactory for patients, according to a study from Beer and colleagues from the University Hospital Ulm, Germany. A survey found tha