No matter what, “There’s an app for that,” right? Not for everything, as Creighton alumnus Munib Sana, BS’07, MD’11, discovered. And so, Sana — no techie, himself — made his own “app for that.”
“That” is Rads Consult, a web-based radiology clinical decision tool for health care professionals and students. It’s built to reduce unnecessary imaging, medical waste and patient risk — and to reduce calls for help to Sana and his fellow professionals.
An independent musculoskeletal radiologist, Sana performs and reads ultrasounds, CTs, MRIs and other imaging for Chicago-area orthopedic groups. He also is on the phone a lot with physicians wanting to know what tests to order in the first place. He’s been taking such calls for nearly a decade.
“And, really, it’s the same or similar questions day in and day out,” he says.
Surprisingly, formal radiology training is not part of medical curricula. Rather, medical professionals learn imaging piecemeal — through trial and error, colleague advice, calls to radiologists or even Google searches.
“You would think there would be some sort of education in how to order and what to order,” Sana says. “When we get out, there’s nothing to show us how to use this practice.”
Physicians waste hundreds of millions of dollars annually, Sana says, by ordering wrong or duplicate studies. And, in some cases, patients can be harmed due to overexposure to radiation or allergic reactions to intravenous dyes sometimes used.
“They’re not benign exams,” Sana says. “It’s a pretty glaring problem.”
About two years ago, one physician calling about what tests to order asked Sana, “Is there an app for this?”
There wasn’t.
“I guess that was kind of the eureka moment.”
Related software did exist but at prices cost-prohibitive to many independent providers and small hospitals. Furthermore, Sana says, such software focused more on compliance with government regulations or integrating imaging into patient electronic records.
Sana says the tools were user-unfriendly. So, he went to work developing a free tool built “the opposite way it’s being done — with the end user in mind.”
Utilizing his own knowledge and other radiology experts, Sana created a tool that guides physicians through a decision-tree imaging request process. He worked on it for more than a year then teamed with a developer to put his ideas into the website at radsconsult.com. Though web-based, it’s mobile-friendly and can be downloaded to perform like a native app.
The site was launched in late 2018. Reaction, Sana says, has been “overwhelmingly positive.”
“Everyone who has used it has said, ‘Wow, this is amazing.’ They’re starting to share it.”
The tool has had about 1,000 users and the site averages about 100 visits a day. That’s with minimal marketing mostly consisting of emails and posts to industry-related Facebook groups.
Creighton has been a help, allowing a pilot program at the University. And former classmates of Sana helped test the tool.
It is, he says, “a passion project.”
He’s not done, either. He plans on improving existing features and adding others. He might monetize it one day, but adds, “In keeping with the core mission of why I’m doing this, there will always be a free version.”
Thanks to Sana, there is an app for that.
