Published by Michael O'Regan
June 9, 2020
Turnkey regenerative therapy standardization, remote patient follow-up and telemedicine solution designed to contribute substantively to management of the elective orthopedic surgery backlog.
Objectives
An analysis recently published in JBJS concludes that it may take up to 16 months until health-care systems can return to performing the pre-pandemic volume of elective orthopedic surgery. Even in optimistic scenarios, there will be a cumulative global backlog of millions of surgical cases after the end of elective surgery deferment. To many, it may seem impossible to close the gap and planning for postpandemic recovery requires addressing the backlog reactively and proactively. However, enhancement of patient surgical throughput alone will not be sufficient.
Greater utilization of remote patient monitoring and telemedicine can be valuable in overseeing patients in the backlog. Tools and protocols for an efficient and successful virtual orthopedic visit are being developed with, for example, patients being provided with virtual visit checklists so that they can confirm a number of items prior to the virtual examination.
Alternative ambulatory treatments options can also make a substantive contribution. Despite that fact that regenerative medicine therapies for musculoskeletal conditions have been available for a number of years, many specialists are hesitant to fully embrace this therapeutic approach because of what they perceive as a lack of standardization which undermines their confidence in the clinical outcome. For example, systems used for the preparation of PRP are highly variable and the majority of publications do not report on platelet concentration. Therefore, if regenerative medicine is to attain its therapeutic potential, there is a need for standardization on various levels to optimize both outcomes for patients and returns for clinics. Key focus areas should be:
Regen Med’s inCytes™ platform can form the core of such a solution.
Components
Implementation
Key performance indicators
Published by Michael O'Regan
June 9, 2020
Turnkey regenerative therapy standardization, remote patient follow-up and telemedicine solution designed to contribute substantively to management of the elective orthopedic surgery backlog.
Objectives
An analysis recently published in JBJS concludes that it may take up to 16 months until health-care systems can return to performing the pre-pandemic volume of elective orthopedic surgery. Even in optimistic scenarios, there will be a cumulative global backlog of millions of surgical cases after the end of elective surgery deferment. To many, it may seem impossible to close the gap and planning for postpandemic recovery requires addressing the backlog reactively and proactively. However, enhancement of patient surgical throughput alone will not be sufficient.
Greater utilization of remote patient monitoring and telemedicine can be valuable in overseeing patients in the backlog. Tools and protocols for an efficient and successful virtual orthopedic visit are being developed with, for example, patients being provided with virtual visit checklists so that they can confirm a number of items prior to the virtual examination.
Alternative ambulatory treatments options can also make a substantive contribution. Despite that fact that regenerative medicine therapies for musculoskeletal conditions have been available for a number of years, many specialists are hesitant to fully embrace this therapeutic approach because of what they perceive as a lack of standardization which undermines their confidence in the clinical outcome. For example, systems used for the preparation of PRP are highly variable and the majority of publications do not report on platelet concentration. Therefore, if regenerative medicine is to attain its therapeutic potential, there is a need for standardization on various levels to optimize both outcomes for patients and returns for clinics. Key focus areas should be:
Regen Med’s inCytes™ platform can form the core of such a solution.
Components
Implementation
Key performance indicators