Canadian Association of Radiologists Genitourinary Imaging Referral Guideline

Abstract

The Canadian Association of Radiologists (CAR) Genitourinary Expert Panel is made up of physicians from the disciplines of radiology, emergency medicine, family medicine, nephrology, and urology, a patient advisor, and an epidemiologist/guideline methodologist. After developing a list of 22 clinical/diagnostic scenarios, a rapid scoping review was undertaken to identify systematically produced referral guidelines that provide recommendations for one or more of these clinical/diagnostic scenarios. Recommendations from 30 guidelines and contextualization criteria in the Grading of Recommendations, Assessment, Development, and Evaluations (GRADE) for guidelines framework were used to develop 65 recommendation statements across the 22 scenarios (2 scenarios point to the CAR Obstetrics and Gynecology Diagnostic Imaging Referral Guideline). This guideline presents the methods of development and the referral recommendations for haematuria, hypertension, renal disease (or failure), renal colic, renal calculi in the absence of acute colic, renal lesion, urinary tract obstruction, urinary tract infection, scrotal mass, or pain, including testicular torsion, adrenal mass, incontinence, urgency, and frequency, chronic pelvic pain, elevated PSA, infertility, and pelvic floor.