Data – PRO-MAPP

Why orthopaedic revisions surgeries benefit from systematic data collection

Posted on November 27, 2024November 27, 2024 by Michael Phillips

Improving patient outcomes is always a priority for revolutionising healthcare. Enhanced resource allocation, streamlined assessments, testings and surgeries, and better staff recruitment can all contribute to speedier times towards treatment. Informing the way that we improve these factors is data.

A digital overhaul regarding reporting and scheduling is finally being honed by major healthcare providers around the world, and analysis of historical surgeries can grant pivotal insights into improving how they can be conducted more effectively in the future. This is especially crucial for revisions, whereby orthopaedic professionals look to correct or re-do previous surgeries.

With a comprehensive revisions database as a north star for orthopaedic surgeons, the standardisation of better patient pathways may be possible. Here’s why.

The projected demand for revision surgeries

One of the main contributors to revision surgery becoming more prevalent is an ageing population. By 2050, the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs predicts that 25% of the world’s population (2.1 billion) will be 60 years or older. That’s double the number from 2024. Those in elderly age categories are more susceptible to musculoskeletal disorders – osteoarthritis, fracture, degenerative diseases etc. – which greatly increases the numbers of revision surgeries to recorrect patient outcomes.

With that comes a growing weight on the global healthcare system to accommodate those needing revision surgeries. It stretches staff and medical supplies, as well as the efficiency between early appointments and final surgery dates (as well as long recovery times that can limit hospital bed capacity). Being able to optimise the operations of hospitals, care centres and more – and to enhance the personalised pathways for each individual patient in need – takes closer readings into the success and failures of past surgeries, all gathered by advanced technologies for data gathering and analysis.

The helpers and hindrances to revisions

On the one hand, advancements in orthopaedic devices are facilitating more successful revision surgeries, resulting in tangible data that can be assessed to reduce complications in future revisions and impact the successes of rehabilitation, too. Robotics are a driving force assisting surgeons with innovative, precise procedural techniques. Bioactive materials and 3D-printed implants contribute to anatomical fit joint replacements, with these patient-specific implants can be created off the back of MRIs and CT scans.

Unfortunately, what holds back the use of medical technologies are strict regulations around their approval. Rigorous testing has to take place before any new devices hit the general market, while their ongoing safety standards for post-surgery have to be continuously monitored.

Key revisions innovations offered by data

Luckily, data collection offers lifelines to get approvals underway, address regulatory hurdles and stop delays in the manufacture of such devices in orthopaedic revisions. And that’s just the start:

Speeding up time-to-market: empirical evidence (in this case, clinical data) can showcase the safety and efficacy of innovative new products, justifying the credibility of manufacturers for any submissions to regulators and making them more readily available for surgeries.
Enhanced product creation: these unique evidence-based factors can also determine the development of bespoke products better suited to individual patient needs. Joint reconstruction, and spinal and trauma implants hold significant market share.
Pinpoint revision outcomes: researchers are able to gain high-quality insights into revision surgeries, including any failures around infection, pain points or instability. From here, they can better refine surgical procedures and raise care standards through following a comprehensively constructed framework.
Using registries to assess trends: datasets can track demographics of patients, as well as their pre- and post-operative conditions over time which, when available through a registry, can signal risks associated with certain segments of patients undergoing treatment.
Assessing minimally invasive procedures: detailed data helps compare the long-term outcomes between emerging and traditional practices in regards to complication rate, impact recovery lengths, and patient comfort, advancing the evolution of revision surgeries.
Effects on insurance: through accurate data collection for revisions, it’s easier to showcase cost-effectiveness and patient satisfaction. In turn, this can persuade insurers to reconsider their policies by highlighting benefits for more timely treatment (or, indeed, the dangers or prolonging it). With insurers more agreeable, much-needed procedures can be conducted without significant financial burdens.

Driving consistent improvements to patient outcomes

Data collected from historical revision surgeries is far from stationary; instead, it is directly actionable to have positive knock-on effects for patients requiring replacement surgery and any post-operative rehabilitation throughout their pathway.

When best practices are established through documented data that assesses the pros and cons of procedural operations, the next step encouraged by orthopaedics is an establishment of a revisions database. Multiple registries, when cross-referenced across the industry, can help benchmark patient outcomes and aspects of post-revision surgery. With tried-and-tested improvements noted for revisions solutions, the field can compile stringent standards.

The orthopaedics speciality, while suffering tough waiting list backlogs due to the appetite for surgery, ageing patients, and the pandemic, is continuously improving. Gaps in knowledge around much-needed revisions are currently being researched and revised, but with a constant reiteration of the most successful capabilities (as shown through data collection) the satisfaction levels for practitioners and patients alike.

Standardising workflows and ‘Getting It Right First Time’: an overview of GIRFT

Posted on November 4, 2024November 26, 2024 by Michael Phillips

Backed by a range of Royal Colleges and professional associations, the Getting It Right First Time (GIRFT) initiative is part of a suite of programmes developed by NHS England. Bringing together powerful data analysis and reviews, it aims to enable healthcare services to improve patient care and pathways across the nation.

Let’s dive in to learn more about its origins, plans, and performance up to this point, as well as looking ahead to its potential future.

GIRFT’s original aims

GIRFT was originally conceived as a pilot methodology for reviewing orthopaedic surgery specialties by Professor Tim Briggs, with its landmark 2015 report coining the term. The research was hosted by the Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital NHS Trust (RNOH) and funded by NHS England. After his team covered more than 140 providers in over 200 hospitals, the subsequent programme (as we know it now) was launched in 2016.

The scheme aims to achieve standardisation for delivering quality patient care across NHS healthcare facilities. Often, clinical practice from site to site can differ greatly, affecting the efficiency of teams, their use of crucial resources, and the level of service they can deliver for patients already experiencing lengthy waiting times for orthopaedic assessments and surgeries.

GIRFT’s greater impact can be felt following the pandemic – a catastrophic incident for patients and NHS staff that faced a battleground each day. Covid-19’s ripple effect has unfortunately seen long physical queues for appointments, but GIRFT’s strategy places staff wellbeing and satisfaction as a high priority, acknowledging the dedication and mental health of key roles at NHS hospitals.

How does it work?

1.Making the most of data

To outline any discrepancies in operations across the country, GIRFT gathers and analyses national data in line with the methodology’s own benchmarking framework. Different arms of the NHS can compare their performance data against both regional or national standards; this allows them to gain empirical metric-backed evidence to inform the effectiveness of their clinical practice in adhering to patients.

2.Teamwork

Using the combined expertise and support of clinicians and management teams at various NHS trusts, the GIRFT’s recommendations can be put into practice and reiterated to determine the actionable, physical changes to healthcare services beyond the data insights. By encouraging meetings among practitioners, as well as data-gathering exercises and continuous learning, this hopes to rollout more standardised patient pathways no longer marred by diminishing variations. This alliance can contribute to the continual improvement of using GIRFT’s findings to foster better outcomes not just at one institution, but many.

3.Strategic plans

Designated ‘enhanced care’ areas have been established to provide flexible support to those requiring post-operative care. The scheme aims to improve patient management for a range of diverse clinical care scenarios, where appropriate and timely intervention can be applied to meet various degrees of clinical needs.

The results (so far)

The flag posts for better pre-operative assessments include reduced repeated testing, the removal of unnecessary face-to-face appointments, and fast-tracking high risk patients that urgently need to be seen by medical professionals. Plus, when resources and staff hours are implemented accordingly for the right tasks, it can have dramatic cost impacts for an NHS that is unfortunately facing financial burden.

Initial findings have seen that, particularly within orthopaedics, hospital trusts that have used GIRST’s assessments have saved outgoings ranging between £20 million to £30 million.

With greater uptake and collaboration involving other specialised trusts, these reductions look set to become more widespread for financial sustainability across the UK. In order to cover more surgical disciplines, GIRFT released 18 additional national documents in 2024 to analyse current procedures, and recommend improvements to deliver quality treatment to NHS patients.

Looking to the future

The environment for effective patient management has certainly improved through the GIRFT programme, and the post-pandemic era serves as a greater opportunity to be ambitious in getting more NHS trusts on board.

The initiative is constantly evolving as surgeries leverage the national data to hand and cross-collaborate to achieve a more effective ecosystem. With uniform pathways, not only can post-operative operations be smoothed for significant cost reduction, but staff and patient satisfaction can be essentially lifted too, revolutionising the running of a stretched NHS.

PRO-MAPP is pleased to have been chosen in GIRFT’s research as a vendor contributing to optimise patient pathways through our Pre-Assessment Clinic Triage product. Discover the full guide here, and chat to us to learn more about our inclusion.

How data-driven solutions can empower remote healthcare NGOs

Posted on September 10, 2024September 30, 2024 by Michael Phillips

Non-governmental organisations (NGO) are mostly associated with social or humanitarian work, including a range of worldwide groups focused on the health and wellbeing of populations on the fringe of national health services. All of these charitable groups, health NGO or not, face tough conditions, and rely on trained voluntary workers and monetary support as just two factors to carry out their respective causes. Add in healthcare’s notoriously tricky, cumbersome systems and advanced medical specialisms, and the job for these remarkable organisations is made evermore difficult.

Alongside the goodwill of generous donations, technological advancements are making exponential differences to ways in which healthcare NGOs can treat underserved patients, even in the globe’s more remote regions. When medical and resources are tight, operational innovation becomes key. But healthtech has even greater knock-on effects in transforming the ways volunteers, medical professionals and patients interact with each other throughout their clinical paths.

The unique problems for remote healthcare

Even the most trusted health systems in developed countries struggle with the pressures of growing populations and modern ailments. If you transfer these troubles to regions without skilled doctors, or even a hospital or small surgery, and healthcare NGOs’ importance is obvious. Like many NGOs, there’s a high level of cultural and social understanding they share with local communities, some of which may be less trusting in doctors, or feel there’s bias against those that can afford their treatment and those that can not.

A healthcare system should, in a perfect world, give equal quality of care to every patient and prioritise those most in need. Not all providers can achieve this in less economical places, however. NGOs in the space do excellent work in providing as much special care as they can and educate local staff that can build rapport with patients. But unlike non-health-related NGOs, there’s a problem in being able to provide regular health check-ups with the same doctors and nurses, and to cross-reference health records (if any) with existing systems. Despite providing a bridge between patients and access to healthcare materials, NGOs can face difficult relationships with these healthcare facilities already in place.

This is why grassroots health NGOs, with enough economic backing and government agency support at their areas of work, must aim to put training procedures in place to improve preventative healthcare solutions for patients until public or private providers can better serve their needs.

From access to tracked pathways

Accessibility is the first hurdle to anyone seeking healthcare, which NGOs strive to provide at the basic level. But their continued success relies on sustaining projects (even with the rising cost of training, delivery, and infrastructure). There’s no immediate magic wand to provide everyone with more stable and regular healthcare, yet through partnerships with research institutions and technological partners, a focused grouped effort goes some way in optimising the clinical paths that work best – without wasting medical resources or the valuable time of voluntary staff.

For one, technology is an outstanding educational tool. Through sharing audio and video training, it’s quicker to raise awareness about ailments, or to onboard local professionals or staff members that can learn the ins-and-outs of their specific roles for efficient procedural workflows at regional or pop-up surgeries. The same applies to support video calls between doctors and patients, where mobile or tablet is applicable, reducing queues of in-person appointments. WhatsApp is becoming an increasingly popular tool for reaching patients in remote areas, who are able to stay updated with doctors that can monitor their condition from wherever they are based.

When documentation is captured digitally, there’s consistency across care teams to track patient pathways – something we’ve experienced working with NGO Faith In Practice in Guatemala. This is why data is becoming such a key asset for remote health work; going beyond areas where paperwork is the only log for any health records, collecting real-time data on appointments or procedural notes is paramount to provide feedback, referrals, and to help each patient understand the next steps required. Ironing out these operations makes it more affordable to allocate fees to host clinics in remote areas, and helps account for only the materials needed with far less repeated manual labour, too.

A brighter future

Beyond this, data has the power to change healthcare systems outside of their individual surgeries. Collecting patient data builds up a reliable picture of the work of health NGOs’ in giving primary care, providing ample kudos to these services when they search for potential funding to better their healthcare programmes, a region’s infrastructure, or even to influence policymakers.

Maintaining health records provides better trust and communication between surgeries and patients for any pathway, no matter where they are in the world. Healthtech is certainly a cost-effective and vital lifeline to do just this, strengthening the great work health NGOs complete every hour, every day.

How to turn EMR data challenges into exciting opportunities for Orthopaedic Surgery

Posted on August 30, 2024September 30, 2024 by Mike Berend

Since the advent of Electronic Medical Records (EMRs), there’s been an overwhelming explosion of data in the healthcare industry. This wealth of information holds immense potential, but it often remains locked away in silos, inaccessible and underutilized. The connection between physicians and patients has now been forever changed, with unintended consequences arising from the disruption caused by “information management solutions.”

In Orthopaedic Surgery, the lack of seamless data integration and visualization has hindered the ability to drive meaningful improvements in patient care and outcomes. However, a new approach is emerging, one that combines the power of in-house data collection, advanced analytics and dynamic visual explainers to help set surgical workflows on the right track.

The rise of same-day surgery in orthopaedics

The demand for same-day surgery has shifted the Orthopaedic Surgery landscape. According to a report by the Ambulatory Surgery Center Association, the number of outpatient surgeries performed in ambulatory surgery centers (ASCs) has increased by 15% annually over the past five years. This trend is expected to continue, with orthopaedic procedures leading the way.

Same-day surgery offers numerous benefits, including reduced costs, improved patient satisfaction, and enhanced efficiency, but it carries unique challenges that only data-led solutions can adhere to seamless data integration, efficient workflow management, and real-time analytics. While these pain points can seem disconnected, there is in fact an easier avenue to consolidate a remedy all in one place.

A unified solution for Orthopaedic Surgery

Our innovative platform, powered by PROMs, eOpNote, and barcode scanning, creates a prospective dataset that is dynamic and valuable, in that it facilitates rapid visualization and process improvement. This integrated system captures every real-time insight into the surgical workflow, from implant utilization to variables affecting outcomes, and even opportunities for improvement.

Better data-driven decision making

The key to unlocking the full potential of this data lies in its clearly mapped-out visuals and its subsequent analysis. Our team has developed cutting-edge data display functions that create real value for Orthopaedic Surgeons and patients alike, and by leveraging advanced analytics and machine learning, we can identify patterns, trends, and correlations that were previously hidden.

With our platform, Orthopaedic Surgeons can now:

Track implant utilization and optimize inventory management
Identify high-risk patients and develop personalized treatment plans
See variables that impact patient outcomes and adjust their approach accordingly
Visualize complex data in real-time, enabling data-driven decision making
Optimize surgical techniques and reduce complications
Increase patient throughput, reduce errors, and streamline billing cycles
Enhance supply chain management and reduce costs
Improve patient satisfaction and reduce readmissions

The future of Orthopaedic Surgery is patient-centric

A more efficient, effective healthcare system relies on a stronger focus on patients. Luckily, transforming the challenges set by data-heavy EMRs are being solved by capturing data to gain invaluable insights from advanced analytics and innovative visualization methods.

Our platform is at the forefront of this change. Surgeons and healthcare operations staff already face a tough job, but technology can step up to empower them to make data-driven decisions, improve patient outcomes, and drive meaningful improvements in the surgical workflow. It marks a turning point in the way that Orthopaedic Surgery continues to evolve, and we are committed to push the boundaries of what is possible in improving patient care.

To learn more about how we enhanced the EMRs for Mount Carmel New Albany, check out our case study.

Tag: Data