How Are We Handling Fluoroscopy-Guided Lumbar Puncture Requests? A Nationwide Survey of Practice Trends.

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE

Referrals to perform fluoroscopy-guided lumbar punctures by neuroradiologists have increased. The purpose of our study was to determine the management of fluoroscopy-guided lumbar puncture referrals in different practice settings.

MATERIALS AND METHODS

We sent an online questionnaire to neuroradiologists and radiology trainees between May and June 2020 to survey their handling of fluoroscopy-guided lumbar puncture requests, preprocedural work-up, and the use of physician extenders/trainees to perform fluoroscopy-guided lumbar punctures, among other questions. Categories were compared using ORs.

RESULTS

Of the 123 US respondents, 81.3% were in combined academic and 18.7% in combined private practice groups. Regarding fluoroscopy-guided lumbar puncture referrals, 27.6% of respondents did not require a bedside lumbar puncture attempt before a fluoroscopy-guided lumbar puncture. Of private practice, 95.7%, and of academic respondents, 85.0%, were often asked to perform fluoroscopy-guided lumbar punctures by clinicians because of the clinician's lack of procedural competence. Of those, 74.8% stated that they always or sometimes agreed to the request. 41.5% of respondents stated that they would always comply with patients' requests for a fluoroscopy-guided lumbar puncture without a bedside lumbar puncture attempt, a 5.26 times higher likelihood (95% CI, 2.04-14.29) for private practice respondents. To perform fluoroscopy-guided lumbar punctures, 32.0% of academic respondents and 47.8% of private practice respondents use physician extenders. 75.0% of academic respondents reported that trainees perform >50% of their fluoroscopy-guided lumbar punctures.

CONCLUSIONS

This survey demonstrates that many academic and private practice neuroradiologists engage in practices that may promote an increase in fluoroscopy-guided lumbar puncture referrals including not requiring a non-image-guided lumbar puncture attempt, complying with clinicians' requests for a fluoroscopy-guided lumbar puncture due to lack of competence in performing lumbar punctures, and fulfilling patient requests for fluoroscopy-guided lumbar punctures.