Effective mammography tracking is a critical component of quality breast care—which is why busy breast centers rely on mammography tracking software to ensure the best results. Here, we’ll dig into mammography tracking to help you determine whether your breast center is adhering to MQSA requirements in this context and providing the level of excellence your patients deserve.
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What is Mammography Tracking?
Basically, mammography tracking is about keeping track of patients, their outcomes, and when they need to return. It includes communication with the patient and their physician, helping to ensure that no patient “falls through the cracks.”
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) offers a more detailed description, which is provided on its page about the Mammography Quality Standards Act (MQSA), in a section entitled “Mammography Medical Audit and Outcomes Analysis”:
- “Each facility must establish and maintain a system to track positive mammographic findings and to correlate such findings with the biopsy results the facility obtains on an annual basis.”
- “At a minimum, the system must track ‘positive mammographic findings,’ which refers to mammograms interpreted as ‘Suspicious’ or ‘Highly suggestive of malignancy.’”
- “MQSA leaves it up to each facility to use a tracking system that works best for it. This system must include a set of procedures to track mammograms, determine whether biopsies were done on the patient, determine (at a minimum) whether the biopsy specimen was benign or malignant, and report this information back to the interpreting physician. The system may be manual or computerized.”
- “Facilities must also include in their audit any patients that they become aware of who were subsequently found to have cancer that was not detected through their mammogram.”
- “The audit analysis must be initiated within 12 months after the date the facility becomes certified. The audit analysis must then be completed within an additional 12 months with subsequent audit analyses to be conducted at least once every 12 months.”
- “The analyses are to be reviewed by an ‘audit interpreting physician’ appointed by the facility. The ‘audit interpreting physician’ has multiple responsibilities listed in 900.12(f)(3) that must be covered in the facility’s audit program.”
- “The inspector will examine the audit system for the inclusion of the above items, ascertain how biopsy results are obtained, and request to see examples of biopsy results that the facility has obtained. If biopsies were recommended but no results were obtained, the facility must provide documentation of attempts to get this information.”
Risk of Manual Processes in a Breast Center
With such detailed requirements, it’s easy to see why so many breast centers rely on mammography tracking software instead of manual methods.
In addition to being cumbersome and time-consuming, manual methods—such as spreadsheets or log books—are prone to human error and create a risk that patients and/or their outcomes may be missed in some way. This can have a negative impact on patient care and also affect MQSA compliance.
In contrast, mammography tracking software ensures checks and balances and notifies breast center staff if an important tracking component is missing.
Plus, when manual processes are automated, breast center staff are freed up, saving both time and money.
How It Works
MagView’s state-of-the-art patient tracking software provides breast centers with the tools needed to be more efficient, more productive, more compliant, and offer an enhanced patient experience.
Fully-Automated Patient Tracking System
The moment imaging results are complete, fully-automated patient notification and follow-up begins. MagView tracks data on a lesion level to ensure follow-up of every single finding and provides users with insight into which patients require more follow-up, next steps, and AI-based suggestions for priority outreach.
“We have hundreds of patients each day. It is reassuring to know that we have a product like MagView to help with the flow and tracking of all our patients.”
– Carrie Hodge, Application Specialist, The Breast Center of Northwest Arkansas
Enhanced Patient Communication
Once the report is available, patient notification/recall letters are automatically generated, and a copy is stored for documentation within the mammography tracking software. Result wait time can be reduced even further for patients with MagView’s HIPAA-compliant Patient Results Portal—which can be embedded in the EMR portal.
AI-Powered Follow-Up Tools
MagView’s AI-driven algorithm can determine a patient’s likelihood to return for their next visit. Our cutting-edge tools lead staff through suggested next steps for follow-up with patients. If a patient cannot be reached on a given day, MagView automatically loads the next contact steps at the appropriate time based on a facility’s processes and procedures.
Integration and Workflow Efficiency
MagView integrates with existing systems for a seamless and comprehensive workflow—including HIS, RIS, PACS, Dictation, and EMR. The end-to-end workflow approach MagView offers includes all areas of breast center operations: patient intake, high-risk screening, result distribution, and cancer navigation, if needed.
Quality and Outcome Reporting
MagView’s mammography tracking reports provide comprehensive insight into the health of your breast imaging practice. One click of a button allows you to take a deep dive into your quality and outcome data.
Read The Daily, Weekly, and Monthly Statistics You Should be Tracking in Your Breast Center
MQSA Compliance
From automatic documentation of results to accurate medical audit and outcome analysis, MagView’s mammography tracking software provides tools to ensure strict MQSA compliance.
With MagView, you can more easily prepare for MQSA inspection since our software provides complete insight into breast center operations—regardless of the size of your breast imaging program.
- Mammography Outcomes & Business Analytics. Mammography outcome data is vital to the success of an imaging practice. MagView’s mammography tracking software is designed to collect and present this data as clearly and efficiently as possible.
- Quality Assurance (QA) Dashboard. The QA Dashboard in our mammography tracking software allows you to view your updated statistics in real-time. With this customizable tool, you can track your team’s numbers at any point throughout the year from any location with internet access.
- Mammography Medical Outcomes. Regardless of breast center workflow and where finding reports are created, the MagView mammography tracking software is the go-to source for tracking and outcome statistics. That explains the robust nature of our QA report. Our latest version provides performance reporting—which includes detailed screening outcome statistics—as well as a readers worksheet. This worksheet provides a visual guide to where your readers lie in regards to PPV and recall rates. We now also include BCSC benchmarks alongside the ACR targets.
For 30 years, MagView has been the trusted source in mammography information systems
If you would like to learn more about how our mammography tracking software can help your breast center, please contact us today.
![shutterstock_1299510538-[Converted]](https://magview.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/05/shutterstock_1299510538-Converted.jpg "monitoring breast density")
