The ACR appropriateness criteria: translation to practice and research.

The ACR Appropriateness Criteria (ACRAC) are now just about a decade old. Along with a continued commitment to update and add to these guidelines, the author advocates that the ACR undertake the task of converting the current text-based contents into a comprehensive, multipurpose relational database. A candidate structure for such a database is described, and several uses for it are articulated. The accompanying policy discussion advocates efforts to widely disseminate the resulting ACRAC database for use by payers in setting reimbursement and by hospitals in radiology order entry software. Also described are some ways that the ACRAC, formatted as a database, can be used for health services research.