Provider Commitment to AirStrip ONE™ as Mobile Strategy for Cardiology Service Lines Grows and Deepens

Provider Commitment to AirStrip ONE™ as Mobile Strategy for Cardiology Service Lines Grows and Deepens

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The numbers are staggering: heart disease is the leading cause of death in the United States, and the associated costs exceed $100 billion annually. Compounding this issue, federal legislation will extend insurance to as many as over the next decade.

Clinician shortages and fast-changing reimbursement trends and care models are driving a growing number of providers to turn to mobility via to strengthen patient care, streamline workflow and reduce costs. Reflecting this growth, AirStrip today announced new research demonstrating the results of its mobility solution, along with successful use cases by Rockdale Medical Center, Palomar Health, Montefiore Medical Center and Sequoia Hospital.

, a part of the LifePoint Hospitals system located in Conyers, Ga., is the first in the greater Atlanta area to be deploying AirStrip ONE Cardiology as a first step toward an enterprise-wide mobility plan.

Rockdale Chief Medical Officer Lisa Gillespie, MD said that the ability to perform off-hours and on-call consults on patient ECGs regardless of the clinician’s location, along with the ability to refer to a historical ECG while simultaneously reviewing a current one, were two powerful motivators.

“Mobility will strengthen our workflow while maintaining HIPAA compliance and break down geographic barriers by improving anytime, anywhere access to crucial cardiac care data,” said Dr. Gillespie. “The ultimate benefits of mobility include improved outcomes. The success stories we have heard elsewhere convinced us that this is the right decision to make on behalf of both our patients and our clinicians.”

At the same time, AirStrip has formed an innovation lab partnership with , the largest public health-care district in California and the most comprehensive health care delivery system in northern San Diego County. Palomar Health will begin using a greatly expanded version of AirStrip ONE Cardiology that incorporates a variety of additional data sources and advanced functionality, including radiology views, EMR access, and providing access to ECGs and labs via secure link sharing.

“When treating patients with cardiac disease - whether it is chest pain, acute MI or congestive heart failure - time is of the essence,” said Orlando Portale, chief innovation officer for Palomar Health. “When physicians have mobile access to minute-by-minute information care processes are improved, as is the ability to effectively treat patients. With that in mind, we see growing potential for integrating mobility across the entire cardiac care continuum.”

“As Palomar Health moves forward as an early adopter of AirStrip ONE Cardiology, we are seeing how mobility can help us treat patients even more effectively,” added Benjamin Kanter MD, chief medical information officer for Palomar Health. “Beyond mobile ECGs, Palomar Health clinicians will be able to view other patient data, including monitoring and EMR data, to offer a more complete picture of patients throughout the entire care cycle.”

Among the stalwart AirStrip clients that see growing value in AirStrip ONE Cardiology is in the Bronx, N.Y., which has seen first-hand the potential for mobility to improve care through such measures as shortened door-to-balloon times, which can reduce patient treatment times and hospital length-of-stay (LoS).

“Mobility allows cardiologists to view diagnostic-quality, near real-time patient data on any device, within seconds, no matter where they are,” noted Mony Weschler, chief applications strategist for Montefiore. “By reducing the time it takes for test results to be delivered to and analyzed by the right clinician, cardiologists can make decisions about patient care much faster and with just as much accuracy as if they were sitting at their desktops.”

Weschler added that mobility has reduced false cath lab activations at Montefiore, which can cost thousands of dollars per event, simply because physicians can more quickly and accurately assess the patient’s condition and determine the appropriate course of action. More importantly, he says, timely cardiology involvement in acutely ill patients with complex dysrhythmias has reduced long-term costs of cardiac care and improved population health by minimizing heart damage.

Adam Harmon, MD, a cardiothoracic surgeon at , a member in Redwood City, Calif., says feedback from fellow clinicians regarding AirStrip ONE Cardiology has been “significantly positive” and that he is looking ahead to incorporating mobility throughout the cardiac care continuum.

“We can't be in the hospital 24 hours a day. Cardiac surgeons are constantly interested in rhythm changes, QRS morphology changes, monitoring a variety of different pressures, and validity of the waveforms. Historically we've had to assess these measurements verbally over the telephone when we are not at or near the bedside,” Dr. Harmon said. “With mobile technology, assessment and potentially a therapeutic intervention can be made virtually immediately. It is a phenomenal step forward.”

Door-to-balloon time is one of the most significant cardiology metrics. Today, . But when cardiologists can access diagnostic-quality ECGs coming directly from the ambulance using AirStrip ONE Cardiology, they can make immediate decisions and save valuable time, in some cases reducing door-to-balloon time to as little as 35 minutes.

“In cardiology, ‘time is muscle’ and reducing event-to-balloon times gets patients through treatment and to the ICU with less damage to their hearts,” said. “They are ultimately healthier, which in turn can reduce the likelihood of readmission within 30 days. With mobility, hospitals can shave nearly a day from their post-STEMI ICU stays, which can save $1,500 per patient. And sometimes, certain interventions is what’s important - the sooner clinicians can identify and communicate a false STEMI, the more savings the health system will see.”

By helping to expedite treatment, AirStrip ONE Cardiology can have a measurable impact on patient health. A retrospective comparative analysis of STEMI patient cases in which AirStrip ONE Cardiology was used, compared to patients with similar demographics and risk levels who were not covered by AirStrip, found that by providing cardiologists with mobile access to ECGs pre-hospital or just after arrival:

In addition to the health and outcomes improvements, mobility via AirStrip ONE Cardiology can also contribute to improved financial performance for cardiology service lines. The estimated impact in this arena includes:

See more information about the impact of AirStrip ONE Cardiology at .

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AirStrip () provides a complete, vendor- and data source-agnostic enterprise-wide clinical mobility solution, which enables clinicians to improve the health of individuals and populations. With deep clinical expertise and strong roots in mobile technology and data integration, AirStrip is empowering the nation’s leading health systems as the industry continues to evolve to new business models, accountable care and shared risk. Based in San Antonio, Texas, AirStrip allows health systems to unlock the full potential of their existing technology investments with a complete mobility solution that provides access to critical patient data across the care continuum. AirStrip is backed by investments from Sequoia Capital, Qualcomm, Inc., Hospital Corporation of America (HCA) and the Wellcome Trust. AirStrip’s base of visionary customers includes HCA, Texas Health Resources (THR), Vanguard Health Systems, Dignity Health and Ardent Health Services.

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