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A vast gap has emerged within family medicine between awareness of the value point-of-care ultrasound (POCUS) offers and its integration into standard workflows. While over 95% of students, residents, and physicians surveyed believe point-of-care ultrasound (POCUS) is important for family medicine, nearlyhalf of all residents and physicians do not use the modality.
This article explores how leading practices can close that gap and scale their usage of POCUS. But first, let’s establish why expanded usage of POCUS is essential for family medicine.
There is a fast-emerging body of research that reveals a wide range of benefits of using POCUS across most clinical areas. The modality is non-invasive, emits very little radiation, and enables fast, flexible access to whole-body imaging.
However, there are several ways the modality specifically improves care within family medicine:
Family medicine often relies upon referrals to give patients answers – leaving them waiting to access CT or MRI machines. But POCUS can be used to diagnose a wide range of conditions at the bedside, or at least rule out certain diagnoses, giving patients greater peace of mind. Family physicians can also leverage their existing knowledge of a patient’s medical history to make more targeted use of POCUS – rendering it a more powerful diagnostic tool.
The net result? POCUS streamlines the diagnostics process and enhances clinical decision-making. Avoiding unnecessary scans that may be expensive or invasive can save patients significant time, money, and discomfort.
The speed and accessibility of POCUS imaging make it a powerful tool for prenatal care, empowering physicians and other key personnel, such as midwives, to generate images at the bedside. This allows them to:
The American Academy of Family Physicians (AAFP) notes that POCUS guidance has become part of the standard of care during many vital procedures, ranging from biopsies to the drainage of fluid collections.
For example, the AAFP notes that POCUS guidance during central venous catheter placement reduces complications, arterial puncture, and time to completion and improves success.
Family physicians require extra information to make more targeted recommendations for managing various conditions and injuries. POCUS can help them monitor specific areas of the body to tailor support and improve the recovery process, with common examples including:
Given these clear benefits, it’s hardly surprising the AAFP has strongly encouraged POCUS adoption in recent years.3 However, most practices still struggle to integrate the modality into their daily workflows with the ease, affordability, and efficiency they need.
There are three primary barriers to the wider adoption of POCUS within the average family medicine unit:
The foundation of an effective POCUS program is widespread access to high-quality devices. But many practices simply lack these basic resources, either replicating the problems of cart-based ultrasound systems – or leading them notto use ultrasound at all. In fact, surveys find that more than 40% of family medicine faculty say their use of POCUS is limited by a lack of available devices.
There are many reasons practices may not have enough devices:
The AAFP praises POCUS as a tool for generalists that doesn’t require extensivespecialized training – but that doesn’t mean it can be integrated into practice overnight. Nearly 80% of both faculty and residents report inexperience in acquiring and interpreting 5 meaning most practices lack sufficient staff with the “three Cs” of POCUS – competence, credentialing, and certification.
POCUS training is becoming more common within undergraduate medical programs, which means this problem may recede over time. But most organizations today still struggle to find the time and resources required to givestaff sufficient POCUS training to enable providers to use the modality within a clinical setting – much less bill for the procedures.
POCUS is considered a cost-efficient alternative to traditional ultrasound systems, with handheld devices costing a fraction of their cart-based competitors. But the costs of purchasing devices and training staff are difficult to cover if the POCUS exams are not billable - and just 6% of family medicine practices currently bill for these procedures.6 This lack of billing is cited by nearly one-third of faculty as a reason for not using the modality.
Vave Health is the world's first wireless, handheld, whole-body ultrasound with a single PZT transducer. Our product and supplementary services reduce the barriers for family medicine to make adopting POCUS easier:
Want to be at the cutting edge of family medicine?
1. https://journals.stfm.org/primer/2023/ludden-schlatter-2022-0096/
2. https://www.aafp.org/pubs/afp.html
3. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35896460/
4. https://journals.stfm.org/primer/
5. https://journals.stfm.org/primer/2023/ludden-schlatter-2022-0096/
6. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35896460/
7. https://journals.stfm.org/primer/2023/ludden-schlatter-2022-0096/
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A vast gap has emerged within family medicine between awareness of the value point-of-care ultrasound (POCUS) offers and its integration into standard workflows. While over 95% of students, residents, and physicians surveyed believe point-of-care ultrasound (POCUS) is important for family medicine, nearlyhalf of all residents and physicians do not use the modality.
This article explores how leading practices can close that gap and scale their usage of POCUS. But first, let’s establish why expanded usage of POCUS is essential for family medicine.
There is a fast-emerging body of research that reveals a wide range of benefits of using POCUS across most clinical areas. The modality is non-invasive, emits very little radiation, and enables fast, flexible access to whole-body imaging.
However, there are several ways the modality specifically improves care within family medicine:
Family medicine often relies upon referrals to give patients answers – leaving them waiting to access CT or MRI machines. But POCUS can be used to diagnose a wide range of conditions at the bedside, or at least rule out certain diagnoses, giving patients greater peace of mind. Family physicians can also leverage their existing knowledge of a patient’s medical history to make more targeted use of POCUS – rendering it a more powerful diagnostic tool.
The net result? POCUS streamlines the diagnostics process and enhances clinical decision-making. Avoiding unnecessary scans that may be expensive or invasive can save patients significant time, money, and discomfort.
The speed and accessibility of POCUS imaging make it a powerful tool for prenatal care, empowering physicians and other key personnel, such as midwives, to generate images at the bedside. This allows them to:
The American Academy of Family Physicians (AAFP) notes that POCUS guidance has become part of the standard of care during many vital procedures, ranging from biopsies to the drainage of fluid collections.
For example, the AAFP notes that POCUS guidance during central venous catheter placement reduces complications, arterial puncture, and time to completion and improves success.
Family physicians require extra information to make more targeted recommendations for managing various conditions and injuries. POCUS can help them monitor specific areas of the body to tailor support and improve the recovery process, with common examples including:
Given these clear benefits, it’s hardly surprising the AAFP has strongly encouraged POCUS adoption in recent years.3 However, most practices still struggle to integrate the modality into their daily workflows with the ease, affordability, and efficiency they need.
There are three primary barriers to the wider adoption of POCUS within the average family medicine unit:
The foundation of an effective POCUS program is widespread access to high-quality devices. But many practices simply lack these basic resources, either replicating the problems of cart-based ultrasound systems – or leading them notto use ultrasound at all. In fact, surveys find that more than 40% of family medicine faculty say their use of POCUS is limited by a lack of available devices.
There are many reasons practices may not have enough devices:
The AAFP praises POCUS as a tool for generalists that doesn’t require extensivespecialized training – but that doesn’t mean it can be integrated into practice overnight. Nearly 80% of both faculty and residents report inexperience in acquiring and interpreting 5 meaning most practices lack sufficient staff with the “three Cs” of POCUS – competence, credentialing, and certification.
POCUS training is becoming more common within undergraduate medical programs, which means this problem may recede over time. But most organizations today still struggle to find the time and resources required to givestaff sufficient POCUS training to enable providers to use the modality within a clinical setting – much less bill for the procedures.
POCUS is considered a cost-efficient alternative to traditional ultrasound systems, with handheld devices costing a fraction of their cart-based competitors. But the costs of purchasing devices and training staff are difficult to cover if the POCUS exams are not billable - and just 6% of family medicine practices currently bill for these procedures.6 This lack of billing is cited by nearly one-third of faculty as a reason for not using the modality.
Vave Health is the world's first wireless, handheld, whole-body ultrasound with a single PZT transducer. Our product and supplementary services reduce the barriers for family medicine to make adopting POCUS easier:
Want to be at the cutting edge of family medicine?
1. https://journals.stfm.org/primer/2023/ludden-schlatter-2022-0096/
2. https://www.aafp.org/pubs/afp.html
3. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35896460/
4. https://journals.stfm.org/primer/
5. https://journals.stfm.org/primer/2023/ludden-schlatter-2022-0096/
6. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35896460/
7. https://journals.stfm.org/primer/2023/ludden-schlatter-2022-0096/
With no hidden fees or other unwelcome surprises, Vave offers high-quality imaging at the best price.
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