Health IT, Hospitals, Patient Engagement, Startups

Surgeon entrepreneur develops video replay for specialist appointments to boost patient education

A video platform to improve patient education make it easier for patients to fully understand a diagnosis or medical procedure

One vexing problem in healthcare is how best to surmount the challenge of explaining a serious diagnosis or complex procedure to a patient. That’s made all the more difficult as patients digest the emotional impact and struggle to retain vital details of that conversation so they can review the merits, raise further questions and try to figure out what to do next.

A neurosurgeon entrepreneur thinks patients should be able to access a video replay of those interactions. He regards it as a way to reduce the stress of those encounters by providing a way to repeatedly go over that information and share it with loved ones and improve patient education.

Part of Dr Randall Porter‘s motivation for developing The Medical Memory was his father’s prostate cancer diagnosis. Despite being a neurosurgeon, it proved difficult to parse together his father’s recall of the diagnosis and that of his physician.

In a phone interview with MedCity News, Porter noted that with technology advancements, patients can and are trying to record these interactions anyway. But by giving physician practices the ability to deploy this platform, the idea is to ensure the whole appointment is recorded and include complex media like MRI images, X-rays and other relevant information, and make it easy for patients to download and share the video interactions with family members. Porter also regards it as a risk aversion tool — a way for physicians to protect themselves from potential litigation. Although he said it’s preferable to getting a copy of their patient record because some of the contents may be lost on recipients, many patients wouldn’t see it as an either-or issue.

Porter said part of the platform allows physicians to see how frequently patients share their videos — which they can access free of charge. He observed that patients typically share them two to five times. About 80 percent of patients take the video when it’s offered to them. It’s also intended to standardize the process of recording and sharing these interactions in a secure way.

Currently the company has recorded 3,500 videos and launched its tablet-based product in January. Although it is mostly available in Arizona, it has focused on specialty practices across oncology, orthopedics and dental.

It generated revenue by having practice customers pay “at cost”
for its hardware and software — Porter estimates it comes out to about $1 per patient per month. He added that as its volume increases, it’s shifting to an ad model. For example when patients get an MS diagnosis, and replay their video, an ad for an MS drug would pop up.

The Medical Memory is working with Barrow Neurological Institute and Dignity-St. Joseph’s Hospital, as well as other Arizona Dignity hospitals, to roll out a multi-center pilot program in July — the start of the 2015-2016 fiscal year.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=19&v=WDW4Ol8q5TI

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