Activities to Minimize Duplicate Diagnostic Tests in Outpatients

 

In outpatient care, if one patient regularly visits several departments for treatment due to a complex condition, each department may prescribe their own diagnostic tests. There are instances when the patient's outpatient follow-up appointments may overlap, or duplicate examinations may be conducted within a short time due to the scheduling. Moreover, even when medical treatments from multiple departments are undertaken on the same day, unnecessary duplicate tests may be requested by the different department involved in patient care. Complaints relating to duplicate tests have continually increased since 2020 and substantial refunds have been made for duplicate tests.

Hence we examined the status of duplicate tests prescribed in the outpatient. In this study, we aimed to improve the system by reducing unnecessary duplicate prescriptions for patients receiving outpatient care.