ArticleJournal of the American Society of Echocardiography : official publication of the American Society of Echocardiography2015
Focused Cardiac Ultrasound in Place of Repeat Echocardiography: Reliability and Cost Implications.
Article in Journal of the American Society of Echocardiography : official publication of the American Society of Echocardiography, 2015. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 9 papers.
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Who cites it
9 citing papers in PubMed, 23 citations in OpenAlex.
- Handheld Ultrasound: Technical Review and International Expert Consensus Recommendations.Diagnostics (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Review
- Right Ventricular Function and Mortality in Critically Ill Patients With Heart Failure and Cardiogenic Shock.International journal of heart failure · 2026Article
- Assessing the clinical relevance of point-of-care ultrasound for hospitalists: Influence on clinical reasoning and decision-making.PloS one · 2025Article
- The quality, safety, feasibility, and interpretive accuracy of echocardiographic and lung ultrasound assessment of COVID-19 patients using a hand-held ultrasound.Echocardiography (Mount Kisco, N.Y.) · 2022Article
- Artificial Intelligence-Enabled Electrocardiography Predicts Left Ventricular Dysfunction and Future Cardiovascular Outcomes: A Retrospective Analysis.Journal of personalized medicine · 2022Article
- Handheld ultrasound to reduce requests for inappropriate echocardiogram (HURRIE).Echo research and practice · 2019Article
- Addition of price transparency to an education and feedback intervention reduces utilization of inpatient echocardiography by resident physicians.The international journal of cardiovascular imaging · 2019Article
- Clinical and historical features of emergency department patients with pericardial effusions.World journal of emergency medicine · 2017Article
- The Preoperative Patient With a Systolic Murmur.Anesthesiology and pain medicine · 2015Review
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Authors and funding
7 authors at 2 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
backgroundHealth care systems are increasingly moving toward models that emphasize the delivery of high-quality health care at lower costs. Rates of repeat echocardiography (two or more transthoracic echocardiographic studies performed within a short interval) are high and can contribute substantially to the cost of providing cardiovascular care. Certain findings from handheld ultrasound scans performed by echocardiographers have been shown to correlate well with findings on transthoracic echocardiography (TTE). It therefore may be feasible and cost effective to use expert focused cardiac ultrasound (eFCU) in place of repeat TTE for highly selected indications in certain settings. The aim of this study was to determine the reliability and cost implications of using eFCU in place of repeat TTE in selected inpatients.
methodsInpatients who underwent repeat TTE (prior TTE within 30 days) ordered for the assessment of ventricular function, pericardial effusion, or inferior vena cava collapse were prospectively enrolled. Subjects underwent eFCU in addition to TTE, and results were compared for correlation using the weighted κ statistic. The potential cost savings of using eFCU in place of TTE were modeled from the provider perspective (i.e., physicians and hospitals).
resultsOver 45 days, 105 patients were enrolled. The majority of scans were performed for assessment of left ventricular function and pericardial effusions. eFCU showed excellent correlation with TTE for most parameters, including left ventricular systolic function (κ = 0.80) and the presence and size of pericardial effusions (κ = 0.81) (P < .001 for both). Adoption of this eFCU protocol could save between $41 and $64 per study, or between $34,512 and $53,871 annually at the authors' institution.
conclusionsFindings from eFCU correlate well with those from TTE when used in the setting of repeat testing for assessment of ventricular function, pericardial effusion, and inferior vena cava collapse. The judicious use of eFCU in place of repeat inpatient TTE has the potential to deliver quality cardiac imaging at reduced cost.
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