Manpower Requirements in Radiology-Reply

The letter from Dr Dodd summarizes a longer article (his reference 2) representing the views of the ACR.Dr Dodd believes that the supply of radiologists was seriously overestimated by GMENAC. As noted in the earlier article, the supply for the specialties was not specifically reconsidered by the follow-up study, which limited itself to determining the needs for the six specialties not previously fully considered by GMENAC. Thus, the letter is directed more toward the original GMENAC effort than the specific publication on the six specialties.However, there are four apparent reasons for the differences between the ACR and GMENAC estimates of supply. First, there is a major difference in defining who is a radiologist. The ACR projections utilize only the numbers of board-certified radiologists; GMENAC supply figures were based on self-declared specialty. Board certification and self-declared specialty are clearly not equal, and there are more who self-declare.