Applied Change Management in Interventional Radiology—Implementation of Percutaneous Thermal Ablation as an Additional Therapeutic Method for Small Renal Masses

• Published in: Diagnostics (Basel) Vol. 12; no. 6; p. 1301
• Main Authors: Lomoschitz, Friedrich M., Stummer, Harald
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Basel MDPI AG 24-05-2022; MDPI
• Subjects: Ablation; change management; Clinical medicine; Dosimetry; Employees; implementation; Kidney cancer; localized kidney cancer; Metastasis; Opinion; Patients; Principles; Radiation; renal cell carcinoma; Surveillance; thermal ablation; transformation; Tumors
• ISSN: 2075-4418; 2075-4418
• DOI: 10.3390/diagnostics12061301

Interventional radiology (IR) has the potential to offer minimally invasive therapy. With this potential, new and arising IR methods may sometimes be in competition with established therapies. To introduce new methods, transformational processes are necessary. In organizations, structured methods of change management, such as the eight-step process of Kotter—(1) Establishing a sense of urgency, (2) Creating the guiding coalition, (3) Developing a vision and strategy, (4) Communicating the change vision, (5) Empowering employees for broad-based action, (6) Generating short-term wins, (7) Consolidating gains and producing more change, and (8) Anchoring new approaches in the culture—are applied based on considerable evidence. In this article, the application of Kotter’s model in the clinical context is shown through the structured transformational process of the organizational implementation of the percutaneous thermal ablation of small renal masses. This article is intended to familiarize readers in the medical field with the methods of structured transformational processes applicable to the clinical setting.