Utilizing 2008--2009 CMS Medicare Data to Demonstrate the Overuse of Computed Tomography Scanning in Medicare Patients

• Activity Number: 418
• Type: Contributed
• Date/Time: Tuesday, July 31, 2012 : 2:00 PM to 3:50 PM
• Sponsor: Health Policy Statistics Section
• Author(s): Emma Boswell*+ and Zheng Wang and Fotios Kokkotos and Hong Yu Xiao and Xuan Dong and Hao Tong and Yang Liu
• Companies: Trinity Partners and Trinity Partners and Trinity Partners and Cornell University and Cornell University and Cornell University and Cornell University
• Keywords: Medicare ; CT scanning ; logistic regression

Abstract

Previous studies have shown that Medicare claims show overuse for Computed tomography (CT) scanning. Some hospitals were shown to have been performing two scans in succession more than 80% of the time for CMS patients with chest symptoms. However, performing a double scan is rarely necessary according to radiologists. The objective of this analysis is to verify the result using the latest Medicare institutional data and explore whether there are certain hospital, physician or patient characteristics that are correlated with the overuse. The analysis was based on 2008-2009 CMS Medicare longitudinal claims data including inpatient and outpatient institutions. The patients with CT procedures were identified by CPT/HCPCS codes. Logistic regression was utilized to understand the CT utilization for Medicare patients. Certain hospital characteristics and patient characteristics, such as geographic region, size of hospital and patient symptoms were found to be correlated with the double scans.