Reimagine Care – an at-home oncology care enabler that recently raised $25 million – has brought its approach to a new kind of patient.
Through a partnership with the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus, Reimagine will be tackling complex bone marrow transplant patients in the home.
CU Innovations – a part of the University of Colorado network – was one of the investors that drove Reimagine’s funding round. From there, the department brought Reimagine’s team to other medical personnel within the university.
“It was a great fit,” Reimagine CEO and co-founder Aaron Gerber told Home Health Care News. “We had this [potential partner] that was interested in finding ways to deliver care for patients in a way that would make the experience for those patients much better, while also be being able to improve clinical outcomes and reduce costs.”
The collaboration will leverage clinical technology, remote patient monitoring and Reimagine’s virtual care center to detect infections in these bone marrow transplant patients.
Bone marrow transplant patients have deteriorated immune systems that need to be built back up over time. If they are victim to infections, those can be life-threatening. Treating and monitoring them in their homes keeps them away from potential infections that may be more prevalent in brick-and-mortar settings, and it also allows them to undergo an arduous recovery process in a more comfortable place.
When infections aren’t detected – or detected too late – that leads to hospitalizations and, overall, poor outcomes for the patient population.
“We can identify signs of fever and infection earlier in these patients, and then send resources to their home, like IVs and antibiotics,” Gerber said. “We want to, for one, decrease the risk of infection by keeping them from having to to leave their homes to either stay in a hotel, come back and forth from a hospital, or both. There’s also good data to show that early intervention with these patients is significant in terms of improving clinical outcomes.”
The initial phase of the program between the two parties focused on its feasibility. Specifically, it looked at febrile neutropenia, which is life-threatening and is treated as an oncologic emergency.
Febrile neutropenia leads to major complications in 25% to 30% of patients, according to a press release. It also leads to death in approximately 10% of patients.
Perhaps most importantly, each hour that goes by without starting antibiotic treatment can increase the risk of 28-day mortality by 18%, according to the press release announcing the program.
And though this program is specific to bone marrow transplant patients, it can be eventually be applied broadly to all kinds of other cancer patients too, Gerber said.
“It is an idea that hopefully will be able to help a broader set of cancer patients,” he said. “It is applicable to the broader population. We chose this population because of how difficult the experience is for these patients, and how vulnerable they are to the risk of infection. But it definitely has application to a much broader cancer population, which is typically immunocompromised to some degree.”
To supplement its virtual care center, Reimagine works with home care agencies who are able to help facilitate the care and resources needed for the patient.
For now, the company is still working to prove the worth of this sort of program. Over time, it wants to scale the model to more patients, and eventually, nationwide.
“As an early-mover in the home-based oncology space, we hope not only to continue innovating to improve outcomes and satisfaction for our patients, but also to inspire other clinicians to lead the new path forward to provide improved patient-centered oncology care for their patients,” Clay Smith, the medical director at CU Innovations, said in a statement.
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