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Review
. 2022 Aug 21;12(8):1344.
doi: 10.3390/jpm12081344.

Structured Reporting in Radiological Settings: Pitfalls and Perspectives

Vincenza Granata  1 , Federica De Muzio  2 , Carmen Cutolo  3 , Federica Dell'Aversana  4 , Francesca Grassi  4 , Roberta Grassi  4   5 , Igino Simonetti  1 , Federico Bruno  5   6 , Pierpaolo Palumbo  5   7 , Giuditta Chiti  8 , Ginevra Danti  5   8 , Roberta Fusco  9
Affiliations
Review

Structured Reporting in Radiological Settings: Pitfalls and Perspectives

Vincenza Granata et al. J Pers Med. .

Abstract

Objective: The aim of this manuscript is to give an overview of structured reporting in radiological settings.

Materials and method: This article is a narrative review on structured reporting in radiological settings. Particularly, limitations and future perspectives are analyzed.

Results: The radiological report is a communication tool for the referring physician and the patients. It was conceived as a free text report (FTR) to allow radiologists to have their own individuality in the description of the radiological findings. However, this form could suffer from content, style, and presentation discrepancies, with a probability of transferring incorrect radiological data. Quality, datafication/quantification, and accessibility represent the three main goals in moving from FTRs to structured reports (SRs). In fact, the quality is related to standardization, which aims to improve communication and clarification. Moreover, a "structured" checklist, which allows all the fundamental items for a particular radiological study to be reported and permits the connection of the radiological data with clinical features, allowing a personalized medicine. With regard to accessibility, since radiological reports can be considered a source of research data, SR allows data mining to obtain new biomarkers and to help the development of new application domains, especially in the field of radiomics.

Conclusions: Structured reporting could eliminate radiologist individuality, allowing a standardized approach.

Keywords: lexicon; quality; radiology; standardization; tumor.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Representation of feature extraction and analysis in a radiomics process.
Figure 2
Figure 2
HCC EOB-MRI assessment. The lesion shows (arrow) hyperinthense signal on T2-W: (A) sequences, (B) arterial hyperenanchement during arterial phase of contrast study, (C) wash-out appearance during portal phase, and (D) hypointense signal during hepatospecific phase.
Figure 3
Figure 3
Colorectal mucinous liver metastases, assessed with non-liver-specific contrast agent. The lesion (arrow) shows hypointense signal in T1-W: (A) sequence; (B) very high hyperintense signal in T2-W; (C) restricted diffusion; and targetoid appearance during (D) arterial, (E) portal, and (F) late phase of contrast study.
Figure 4
Figure 4
MRI assessment post n-CRT treatment: fibrotic response in T2-W axial (arrow) (A) and sagittal plane (arrow) (B).
Figure 5
Figure 5
Pancreatic cancer patient. MRI staging assessment (arterial (A) and portal (B) phase of contrast study). The arrows show right hepatic artery origin from the superior mesenteric artery.
Figure 6
Figure 6
Cholangiocarcinoma patient, classified as LR-M according to LI-RADS, due to targetoid appearance (arrow) in T2-W (A) sequence, in (B) DWI, and (C) late phase of contrast study.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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