Starting a Free Ultrasound Clinic for the Underserved: Considerations and Overcoming Challenges.
Many radiologists are interested in providing affordable care to underserved populations but are unsure how to accomplish it. We present a model for providing imaging services to the underserved with an emphasis on the challenges we encountered and strategies we used to overcome them. In partnership with our medical school's student-run free clinic, we developed a community-based ultrasound service that provides diagnostic ultrasound examinations to an uninsured urban population to address the need of timely access to care and integrated follow-up care. Image storage and reporting were fully integrated with our existing imaging informatics and electronic medical record systems. Radiology residents play a central role in the operation of the service while gaining hands-on ultrasound experience, in partnership with volunteer sonographers, radiology attendings, and medical students.
['Tadros|Anthony|A|', 'Manning|Paul|P|', 'Smitaman|Edward|E|', 'Chong|Alice|A|', 'Wang|Kang|K|', 'Tamayo-Murillo|Dorathy|D|']
D000554:Ambulatory Care Facilities D006801:Humans D008507:Medically Underserved Area D013337:Students, Medical D014463:Ultrasonography D014838:Volunteers
Ultrasound underserved student-run free clinic