At the 2019 Institute for Healthcare Improvement conference, providers from all over the world spoke on quality improvements in healthcare. This year, Dr. Candace Westgate of Adventist Health presented on the Adventist Health Early All-Around Detection (AHEAD) program she implemented as a population health strategy to identify and manage patients at high risk for cancer.
Dr. Candace Westgate is an OB/GYN and the Medical Director of one of the largest population genetics screening programs in the country.
In this article we will look at the AHEAD program and review:
Dr. Westgate started the AHEAD program with one goal in mind: Implement a population health strategy to identify and manage patients at high risk for cancer. However, she faced these roadblocks:
Aside from these common roadblocks, Dr. Westgate identified several problem areas in Adventist Health's screening program:
To reach more patients, Dr. Westgate needed to get primary care providers involved in the screening process, but with limited provider knowledge of genomics and resources.
Dr. Westgate used the AHEAD program to empower specialists, primary care, and breast imaging centers to provide genetic cancer risk assessments in rural community settings. She set out to ensure patients in rural settings received the same access to genomics as those from major cities. To do this with limited resources, she had to answer a few questions:
To reach her patient population, Dr. Westgate needed to leverage technology. Using CancerIQ, she was able to
Leveraging software allowed Dr. Westgate to ensure a standard process to capture all patients in any setting, with automated evaluation against national guidelines. For example, she can assure all patients are screened against NCCN, SGO, and USPSTF guidelines - including when they update.
CancerIQ not only equips Adventist Health's providers with decision support, but allows patients to self-manage genetic predispositions over time. With shared decision making, personalized planning, and proactive patient care, Adventist Health's providers can now efficiently provide decision support and manage patients at risk for cancer.
Leah Marcantel, Nurse Navigator with CHRISTUS Health, dives deeper into patient tracking and management in a recent blog post.
To proactively treat cancer, Dr. Westgate needed to effectively track and follow-up with patients. Rather than use a clunky Excel spreadsheet, Dr. Westgate leveraged CancerIQ to ensure patients were appropriately engaged with. She can see who needs to be contacted for testing or appointments.
Dr. Westgate is achieving her goal of implementing a population health strategy to identify and manage patients at risk for cancer by leveraging technology to ensure genetic cancer risk assessment is available to her population. Incorporating CancerIQ has provided Adventist Health both clinical and financial benefits.
Clinical Impact:
Financial Impact:
Dr. Westgate will be joined by Dana Zanone, Vice President of Health Information Organization at Adventist Health, at HIMSS 2020. You can learn more about their HIMSS presentation here (INSERT LANDING PAGE)
Dr. Westgate chose to leverage CancerIQ to ensure Adventist Health was reaching its population health efforts. What are you doing to ensure your health system reaches its population health efforts?
Learn more about the success of her population health initiative here.