[Radiology in Scandinavia]

In 1987 the Nordic Institutes of Hospital Research joint co-operation on medical technology assessment (NEMT) performed a study of the national differences in the utilization of diagnostic techniques in the radiological laboratories. Major differences between the countries were found in both total and specific examination rates. In total numbers of conventional investigations, Finland performed about 60 per cent more investigations than the average of Sweden, Denmark and Norway, which all were of the same level of approximately 470 examinations per 1,000 inhabitants. The difference was attributed mainly to X-ray investigations executed at the primary health care level in Finland. Other remarkable differences were in particular observed in techniques of increasing or decreasing importance.