Digitization of medicine: how radiology can take advantage of the digital revolution.

In the era of medical cost containment, radiologists must continually maintain their actual and perceived value to patients, payers, and referring providers. Exploitation of current and future digital technologies may be the key to defining and promoting radiology's "brand" and assure our continued relevance in providing predictive, preventive, personalized, and participatory medicine. The Association of University of Radiologists Radiology Research Alliance Digitization of Medicine Task Force was formed to explore the opportunities and challenges of the digitization of medicine that are relevant to radiologists, which include the reporting paradigm, computational biology, and imaging informatics. In addition to discussing these opportunities and challenges, we consider how change occurs in medicine, and how change may be effected in medical imaging community. This review article is a summary of the research of the task force and hopefully can be used as a stimulus for further discussions and development of action plans by radiology leaders.