Health IT, Hospitals, Startups

Can a pre-operative risk assessment tool reduce healthcare costs and improve outcomes?

Health IT startup QPID Health, formed at Massachusetts General, has rolled out its first clinical […]

Health IT startup QPID Health, formed at Massachusetts General, has rolled out its first clinical decision support tool for its cloud-based platform, QPID. It works on top of providers’ electronic medical record systems and is designed to be used before high-cost, high-volume medical procedures. The idea is for physicians to use the tool to develop a better way to balance the need for a procedure with the patient’s risk factors, and it fits the healthcare industry trend of looking for ways to reduce healthcare costs.

The guide relies on QPID’s EMR search technology to upload information from the patient’s electronic health record. It calculates the level of risk associated with the procedure, whether it is appropriate for that patient, and also factors in models published in specialty guidelines. The risk assessment score is included in the consent forms that are discussed with the patient.

Clinicians can choose to use or ignore the recommendation but it’s designed to be factored into their decision making.

In an interview, QPID Health CEO Mike Doyle said that by using the Q-Guide, eventually hospitals will no longer have to clear certain medical procedures with payers ahead of time — a process referred to as prior authorization. Doyle points out that the guide could eliminate the need for the big administrative workforces hospitals employ to clear medical procedures with insurers and the payer staff members who take those calls.

Currently, the Q-Guide is limited to the high-cost and high-volume procedures typical of cardiovascular and orthopedic surgery such as hip and knee replacements. But after a pilot of the pre-operative tool by 150 clinicians at Mass General in 1,100 procedures, the plan is to expand it to more procedures.

QPID Health collaborated on the Q-Guide with Massachusetts General Hospital and the Massachusetts General Hospital Physicians Organization.

Doyle said it expects to roll out the guide to all eight hospitals in the Partners Health System by the start of 2015.

Last year, the company raised $4 million in a Series A round from Matrix Partners, Partners Innovation Fund, Massachusetts General Physicians Organization and Cardinal Partners. It’s in the process of raising funds for a Series B round as it readies a sales and marketing push for the clinical decision support tool to other health systems.

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