Within Health: 3 Common Use Cases
Within Health offers radiology departments intelligent communication tools that track and communicate findings and recommendation across digital channels (email, sms, eFax) to drive patients to the right next step — be it an appointment with their PCP, additional imaging, or a pathology test. The company is working on several use cases that drive better patient outcomes, decrease provider liability, and lead to increased revenue:
1. Incidental Findings Communications. Often patients go to an emergency room and get CT scans or other imaging tests done, which reveal incidental findings that don’t relate to the visit — things like lung nodules, adrenal lesions, or kidney cysts. These incidental findings are typically not relayed back to the patient or their primary care provider in an effective manner and can lead to serious complications down the line. A large integrated health system in the New York metro area engaged Within Health to design and operate a standardized follow-up identification and communication program for incidental lung nodules in the emergency department. Within Health’s Incidental Findings Manager detected incidental lung nodules looking at historical chest CT data and engaged patients and primary care providers by sending communication campaigns and reminders to them after the patient was discharged.
2. PA Act 112 Communications. A private academic network in Pennsylvania was sending certified letters to patients to comply with the Patient Test Result Information Act (Act 112), which is a law that requires that a patient be notified within 20 days by an outpatient diagnostic imaging center or healthcare facility if a significant abnormality is detected. Radiology reports that required a follow-up were manually tagged by radiologists and loaded into a work list managed by front office staff who printed and sent out patient letters. The group engaged Within Health to design and operate digital communication campaigns for Act 112 patients to improve engagement and drive down manual communication costs. Within Health identified key campaign triggers in the current workflow, and loaded each case into email and text message campaigns with a call to action to schedule a follow-up appointment digitally.
3. Preventive Health Communications. An academic university in Boston was looking to engage patients that met the criteria for preventive osteoporosis exams — i.e. women 65 years or older who are at high risk of fracture. In the current state, only 8% of the patient population that met the criteria to receive a preventive DEXA exam had received one. Within Health deployed their communication module to send patient messages across multiple channels (text messages, email, and in-portal notices) to drive preventive screening rates. The module initiated patient communications, tracked interactions, and drove patients to a digital scheduling tool, which resulted in an increase in primary care provider appointments for osteoporosis prevention.
