Determinants of radiologists' desired workloads.

PURPOSE: To examine what factors lead radiologists to desire different work hours.
MATERIALS AND METHODS: Particular attention was paid to the intensity of work, measured in procedures per work hour, a potentially important variable previously largely ignored. Weighted data from the ACR's 2003 survey of radiologists were used. Multiple linear regression was used to analyze the influences of characteristics of individual radiologists and the practices in which they worked on their desired annual workloads.
RESULTS: Increasing the work intensity of the average radiologist by 1 procedure per hour (11%) decreased the annual desired work hours by 2.3 hours (0.1%). Older radiologists sought smaller workloads. For example, the desired annual work hours of radiologists aged 65 years and older were 262 annual hours fewer than those of radiologists aged 45 to 54 years. The desired annual work hours of radiologists in academic practices were more (by 213 hours) than those of radiologists in private, nonacademic radiology groups. In addition, the desired annual work hours of radiologists in practices situated in the West and Northwest census regions were fewer than those of radiologists in practices in the South.
CONCLUSION: Radiologists who worked more intensively sought fewer annual work hours, but the effect of greater work intensity on desired hours was very small. The very small size of this effect makes it likely that radiology practices will continue, as they have in the past, to accommodate the increasing imaging workload in the United States by increasing the intensity of their work rather than by lengthening hours.