By GREGORY ZELLER //
A Long Island stalwart of product design and development is lending its considerable expertise to a comprehensive effort to create a working “hospital at home” model.
Introducing the Advancing a Sustainable Hospital-at-Home Ecosystem at Scale project, an action-oriented attempt by the Massachusetts-based Digital Medicine Society and the Virginia-based Consumer Technology Association – in collaboration with healthcare and technology stakeholders across the nation – to enable true “hospital at home” services.
Maximizing the effectiveness and availability of such services could prove to be a watershed moment for the entire healthcare industry, with benefits ranging from better clinical decision-making to healthier patient outcomes to improved economics for patients, insurers, providers and everyone else.
The Digital Medicine Society, a 501(c)3 nonprofit driving the broader adoption of digital medicine, and the Consumer Technology Association, a nonprofit trade organization representing nearly 1,400 U.S. tech companies, are partnering with the University of Massachusetts’ Chan Medical School on the project.
Their primary mission is to establish solid provider-reimbursement and return-on-investment protocols, while showcasing how a hospital-at-home model benefits patients and providers alike.
Brad Carlson: Collaborative advance.
To get there, the partners have recruited a virtual army of stakeholders and expert technologists – including Hauppauge-based product design and development firm Intelligent Product Solutions, which brings long medical-technology experience to the multifaceted table.
Brad Carlson, IPS’s vice president of technology and business development, noted the project’s “significant” potential for improving patient and provider safety, and to provide healthier outcomes for patients and better bottom lines for all.
As both a proactive guardian of good health and a reactive agent of sick care, hospital-at-home services – shorthanded to “connected care” by the project partners – has the ability to focus the entire healthcare industry more squarely on patients, agreed Digital Medicine Society Associate Program Director Abby Sugg.
What’s needed most is a robust assortment of interoperable home-based health devices, designed specifically to work together to maintain wellness, promote prevention, manage chronic conditions and even facilitate clinical trials.
And with more than 20 partner organizations pitching into the connected-care project – including multinational computer-technology giant Oracle, renowned Florida-based hospital system The Mayo Clinic, the nonprofit Medical Device Innovation Consortium, the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs and other heavy hitters – organizers could not ask for a better medical-device expert than IPS, according to Sugg.
“As an inaugural member of this project, IPS brings its med-tech product design expertise to this pivotal moment,” Sugg said, adding the project would “shape the future of healthcare and harness the power of digital innovation to create a connected, healthier world for all.”
That’s not overstated hyperbole: According to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, a federal agency within the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, hospitals offering inpatient-level care at home – a practice sparked by the COVID-19 pandemic – have experienced reduced costs and improved health outcomes.
For IPS, which became a subsidiary of global manufacturer/distributor Forward Industries in 2018, working on the leading edge of that healthcare revolution is both a challenge and a privilege, Carlson noted.
“We are thrilled to participate in this collaborative community to work toward impactful advancements in connected health and to improve in-home patient care,” the vice president added.
