{"doi":"10.1210/jendso/bvaf143","title":"Evaluating the Total Healthcare Cost of Inappropriately Ordered Thyroid Ultrasounds","abstract":"Purpose: Overuse of thyroid ultrasound (TUS) has contributed to rising thyroid cancer diagnoses and is projected to increase US healthcare costs from $1.5 billion to $3.5 billion by 2030. This study evaluated the healthcare cost of inappropriately ordered TUS in a national multicenter academic system. Methods: This is a secondary cost analysis of a retrospective cohort study across 4 Mayo Clinic sites (Rochester, MN; Jacksonville, FL; Scottsdale, AZ; and the Midwest Mayo Clinic Health System). Adult patients (≥18 years) undergoing their first TUS between January 1, 2017, and December 31, 2021, with at least 1 year of follow-up were included. TUS indications were classified as appropriate or inappropriate using a guideline-based natural language processing algorithm. The primary outcome was a comparison of adjusted 1-year all-cause healthcare costs. A secondary analysis calculated the direct procedural costs of the inappropriate TUS cascade. Results: < .0001) but otherwise demographically similar. Adjusted total healthcare costs over 90 days and 1 year were comparable: $4842 vs $5794 and $13 748 vs $14 257 for inappropriate vs appropriate TUS, respectively. The inappropriate TUS cascade, including an estimated 56 subsequent biopsies and 22 thyroidectomies, resulted in a minimum of $576 134 in direct procedural costs. Conclusion: While adjusted total costs were similar, inappropriate TUS represents potentially avoidable spending and remains a viable target for cost-reduction strategies. Reducing low-value imaging remains a critical target for cost-saving interventions.","journal":"Journal of the Endocrine Society","year":2025,"id":546580,"datarank":0.0,"base_score":0.0,"endowment":0.0,"self_citation_contribution":0.0,"citation_network_contribution":0.0,"self_endowment_contribution":0.0,"citer_contribution":0.0,"corpus_percentile":null,"corpus_rank":null,"citation_count":1,"citer_count":0,"citers_with_citation_signal":0,"citers_with_endowment":0,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"is_dataset":false,"is_dataset_confidence":0.7816,"is_data_producer":false,"deposit_databanks":null,"is_oa":true,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"has_version_chain":false,"published_date":"2025-01-01","fair_score":null,"fair_percentile":null,"algorithm_id":"datarank_citation_only_1hop_v6","ranking_scope":"data_only","authors":[{"id":1004207,"name":"Viengneesee Thao","orcid":"0000-0003-2136-3540","position":1,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":371207,"name":"Bijan J. Borah","orcid":"0000-0002-4526-462X","position":2,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1083841,"name":"Cristian Soto Jacome","orcid":"0000-0002-6186-748X","position":3,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1438678,"name":"Felipe Larios","orcid":null,"position":4,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1438242,"name":"Kerly Guevara","orcid":"0000-0003-1881-3571","position":5,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1438679,"name":"Luis Vilatuna Andrango","orcid":null,"position":6,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1438680,"name":"Ana Cristina Proano","orcid":null,"position":7,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":371399,"name":"Jungwei Fan","orcid":"0000-0001-6349-3752","position":8,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1023917,"name":"Ricardo Loor-Torres","orcid":"0009-0003-8411-9083","position":9,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1277088,"name":"Misk Al Zahidy","orcid":null,"position":10,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1277086,"name":"Esteban Cabezas","orcid":null,"position":11,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1438243,"name":"Yucheng Wu","orcid":"0000-0002-1549-0546","position":12,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":406174,"name":"Megan E. Branda","orcid":"0000-0003-0779-6876","position":13,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":691324,"name":"Naykky Singh Ospina","orcid":"0000-0001-7229-5061","position":14,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":305579,"name":"Juan P. Brito","orcid":"0000-0003-1840-1745","position":15,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1023916,"name":"David Toro-Tobón","orcid":"0000-0003-1910-4144","position":0,"is_corresponding":true}],"reference_count":16,"raw_metadata":null,"created_at":"2026-07-19T02:53:32.285899Z","pmid":"40980541","pmcid":null,"fwci":null,"citation_percentile":null,"influential_citations":0,"oa_status":null,"license":null,"views":0,"total_file_size_bytes":0,"version_count":0,"fair_f":null,"fair_a":null,"fair_i":null,"fair_r":null,"fair_zscore":null,"fair_rationale":null,"fair_model":null,"fair_agent_version":null,"fair_fulltext_source":null,"fair_has_llm":null,"fair_computed_at":null,"clinical_trials":[],"software_tools":[],"db_accessions":[],"linked_datasets":[],"topics":[]}