LAUSR

As a medical specialty, radiology is well suited for remote work. In fact, for more than two decades, radiologists have benefited from the Internet and picture archiving and communication systems (PACS) to interpret imaging examinations remote from the location where the examination is performed through teleradiology, often from home. The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic and resultant mitigation efforts, particularly social distancing, rapidly accelerated work-from-home arrangements across the globe, including within radiology. Two timely surveys of the membership of the Society for Pediatric Radiology (SPR) and the Society of Chiefs of Radiology at Children’s Hospitals (SCORCH) by Seghers et al. [1], reported in this issue, provide important insights into various aspects of working from home that are pertinent to pediatric radiology. We thank the authors for this important contribution to our understanding of this complex and rapidly evolving new normal. The results of these two separate surveys, sent to SPR and SCORCH members, clearly demonstrate a shift away from working physically at the hospital/clinic during the pandemic to working from home, with only 4% of responding departments not performing any rotation from home during the pandemic [1]. The majority of respondents (81–94%) had a home PACS workstation provided by their department and were satisfied with their ability to work from home, with the majority of respondents in both surveys indicating they took 40% or fewer rotations from home [1]. These responses suggest that most departments took a hybrid-model approach with a mixture of on-site and remote radiologist rotations. The respondents, however, indicated their reduced ability to teach trainees and reduced emotional engagement as the primary drawbacks of working from home. Despite these perceived drawbacks, the majority of respondents in both surveys favored a work-from-home model post-pandemic, though the majority indicated that work from home should be limited to less than 60% of shifts [1]. Society for Pediatric Radiology respondents indicated that the lack of commute, the flexible work schedule and improved efficiency from participating in meetings remotely were the major benefits of working from home. Commuting to and from work is not only an important work-related stressor and time sink but also a significant expense and contributor to greenhouse gas emissions. A working paper from the Becker Friedman Institute estimated that 62 million commuting hours per day were saved by Americans during the pandemic as the result of the shift to working from home [2]. Commuting distance has been shown to be adversely associated with physical activity, cardiorespiratory fitness, adiposity and indicators of metabolic risks [3]. The lack of daily commute was the most significant benefit of working from home, as indicated by > 90% respondents in the SPR survey [1]. Interestingly however, the Becker Friedman Institute working paper found that for employees with a graduate degree, the majority of the time saved by eliminating daily commuting (37.7%) went toward more work for the individual’s primary job, much more than was spent on leisure activities, childcare, exercise or chores [2]. So while commuting time savings is viewed as a positive, some of that time saved appears to be devoted to performing more work from home. Physician burnout, including among pediatric radiologists, is on the rise [4]. Flexibility in work schedule and increased autonomy provided by working from home could help in mitigating burnout by providing improved work–life balance [5]. Flexibility in childcare and eldercare associated * Govind B. Chavhan [email protected]