Tele-PreHab for Total Joint Replacement Surgery Reduces Costs and Improves Outcomes, According to Study Published in the Annals of Translational Medicine

SAN FRANCISCO, Jan. 23, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- PeerWell, whose mobile PreHab technology helps patients prepare for surgery, today announced the results of a study published this month in the Annals of Translational Medicine. The study showed that comprehensive preoperative optimization, delivered via PeerWell's artificial intelligence (AI) platform, significantly improved hospital length of stay, discharge disposition and skilled nursing avoidance for patients undergoing total knee replacement surgery.

Total joint replacement surgery is one of the most prevalent and expensive surgeries in the United States and has come under intense scrutiny in recent years. The largest insurers in the world, including Medicare, have changed regulations to put the onus to reduce cost while maintaining high quality onto care providers. This dynamic has left many surgeons and hospitals in a bind, shouldering more administrative work for less reimbursement.

In a large, retrospective study, pre-operative education, called "PreHab", was associated with a reduction in surgery costs of $1,215 - with one big catch: PreHab had to be delivered in person by a physical therapist. Many insurance plans only allow for a small number of paid physical therapy sessions per year, making surgeons reluctant to use them before surgery.

This study shows that PeerWell's AI-based PreHab platform was able to deliver effective preoperative optimization without the need for clinicians. A patient's use of PeerWell led to significant cost reductions including a 25 percent drop in hospital length of stay, an 80 percent increase in going home without the need for home care and a staggering 91 percent reduction in discharges to skilled nursing facilities.

"We've known PreHab is an effective way to improve outcomes for total joint patients for years," began Dr. Michael Mont, vice president of strategic initiatives in orthopaedics at Northwell Health. "The question, until now, has always been how to provide it to patients within the constraints of insurance. Now, thanks to autonomous tele-PreHab systems like PeerWell, we can solve this problem."

PeerWell's platform uses patient data to create personalized daily plans to get patients ready for surgery. Plans include video physical therapy, nutrition counseling, comprehensive anxiety management and pain resilience training, home preparation guidance and medical risk management. By using machine learning, PeerWell can also glean clinically relevant data from ordinary smartphones. For example, using the accelerometer and gyroscope, PeerWell can track range of motion or by using the smartphone camera, PeerWell can identify trip and fall hazards in the home.

"We've seen consistent results at sites across the United States that prove PeerWell PreHab works," said PeerWell CEO Manish Shah. "Not only do we know PeerWell works to improve surgery success and recovery, we know that the improvements it delivers in length of stay and discharge disposition add up to a significant cost savings."

"Our ability to do this without increasing administrative burden to the provider has made PeerWell the preferred solution to manage musculoskeletal health. We've created tele-prehab and tele-rehab programs for all major orthopaedic procedures and see consistent improvements in patient outcomes across the board."

To find out more about PeerWell, please visit: https://www.peerwell.co/professionals/. The full study can be read here.

About PeerWell
PeerWell is a healthcare technology company founded by Manish Shah, Navin Gupta and Evan Minamoto that helps patients prepare for and recover from major episodes of care with its PreHab-to-ReHab mobile platform. Every year 50+ million people undergo major procedures like joint replacement surgery, coronary bypass surgery and chemotherapy. Using PeerWell, patients complete personalized 4-5 item daily checklists that get them mentally, physically and environmentally ready for surgery so they can recover faster. Learn more about PeerWell's fully automated PreHab-to-ReHab patient solution at https://www.peerwell.co.

Contact: Kerin Norton, [email protected]

SOURCE PeerWell

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