Application of Gemstone CT with Low Tube Voltage and Low Dosage Contrast Medium in Evaluating Preoperative Living Donor Renal Artery / 中国医学影像学杂志

PurposeTo explore the gemstone CT with low tube voltage and low concentration contrast medium in evaluating renal artery imaging of preoperative living renal transplantation donor.Materials and Methods Fifty cases of living kidney donor underwent spiral CT angiography of renal artery before operation. The patients were randomly divided into double-low group (25 patients) with 100 kV and Visipaque (270 mg/ml), and control group (25 patients) with 120 kV and Iopromide (370 mg/ml). Image reconstruction of 40% ASiR was used in both groups. The image quality score, CT values of renal arteries, contrast-to-noise ratio (CNR), noise, radiation dose and the amount of contrast agent of the two groups were recorded and compared.ResultsKappa coefifcient analysis showed that the consistency in evaluating image quality between two radiologists was excellent (Kappa=0.82). The CT value of the renal arteries and image quality did not show signiifcant difference between the two groups (t=1.05, 0.07 and 1.62,P>0.05). The CNR, noise and average radiation dose were statistical different between the two groups (t=2.92,-6.95 and-2.21,P<0.05). The contrast medium dosage of double-low group was decreased by 27% when compared with that of the control group.Conclusion Satisfied image quality of renal artery CTA can be obtained with low tube voltage (100 kV) and low concentration contrast medium (270 mg/ml) combined with iterative reconstruction algorithm. It can be used as a routine method in preoperative examination of living renal donors.

Review on the pay for performance impact on hospital costs / 中国卫生政策研究

Objective:To analyze the pay for performance related costs and provide suggestions for further stud-y. Methods:Empirical literatures from inside the country and overseas were collected with a systematic review. Costs were summarized on the basis of three drivers ( performance appraisal, performance improvement and incentive per-formance) . Results:A total of 141 papers, 47 in Chinese and 94 in English were enrolled. Most papers in Chinese were subjected on healthcare facilities while the English ones emphasized on hospitals. Pay for performance may lead to the healthcare service costs, regulation costs and the resources allocation related costs reduction. In addition to these visible costs, a large amount of others hidden from different hospital management levels were also due to pay for performance. Conclusions:(1) Differences in costs could be found from home and overseas experience which per-haps resulted from the pay for performance, the supporting measures and the policy development. (2) More attention should be paid to the quantification researches on the health facilities’ hidden costs. (3) Most available researches fo-cus on pay for performance cost-effectiveness from the society and service purchase but not the providers’ perspective and the hidden costs were also ignored.