Nighthawk Teleradiology Services - Convenient and Efficient

Why do hospitals use nighthawk after-hours teleradiology services? Convenience, value for recruiting and efficiency, according to a new survey.

Of the hospitals that participated in the study, 51% of practices said that they obtain between 1%-5% of their reads from the nighthawk service and 22% said that they receive less than 1%. The study also showed that 25 of the 63 practices surveyed (about 40%), utilized a nighthawk service located internationally.

Of these, 40% did not know the proportion of foreigners or Americans reading films. Another 56% said that the radiologists reading internationally were either all American or mostly Americans, and one practice said that it was about 50% Americans.

“While the results of this study may not have direct impact on patient care, knowledge of the utilization of after-hours teleradiology services may provide important information regarding both the current state and the future of such services,” said [the survey lead author] Mr. [Adam] Kaye.

“Hopefully we can use the information from our study as a basis for future, similar studies to document the progression of this relatively new and somewhat controversial topic,” he said.

Meanwhile, the Morningstar stock market research company features Nighthawk Radiology Holdings as one of its "stocks that have recently jumped to 5 stars". It says:

NightHawk is a heavyweight in the night-time teleradiology industry. While most players consist of a handful of radiologists operating solely within a region or state, NightHawk's 100-plus radiologists and expansive client base (more than 20% coverage of all U.S. hospitals) facilitates a large volume of daily radiology interpretations and makes better use of each radiologist's time, an important factor considering the shortage of U.S. radiologists....

What the Market Is Missing
Worries about increasing price competition within the industry and uncertainty about NightHawk's position in its new daytime teleradiology business have caused the market to discount the firm's profitable operations, its leading industry position, and its claim over the industry's scarcest resource: U.S. radiologists. [Analyst Karen] Yiu thinks NightHawk's efficient processes, relatively high customer retention rate, and industry growth opportunities make the stock a good bargain at current prices.

May 16th, 2007