Revolutionizing Healthcare Sector

Michael Margiotta has been a pioneer in the healthcare technology space for nearly 20 years. His newest venture, iPatientAxis, seeks to improve overall public health thanks to a streamlined process for conducting clinical trials. Specifically, iPatientAxis addresses the significant gap that exists between the time that a patient is identified for a trial and when they are screened and consented. The net results? Lower cost, greater reliability and enhanced patient engagement.

" It now takes more than six months from the time a site was activated until the first volunteer consents and enrolls. This is simply too much wasted time especially since today nearly all data needed to inform enrollment is digital. It's time to stop talking about the value of real-world clinical data and actually start using it. "

Though relatively young, iPatientAxis has successfully created a paradigm shift in how patients are qualified and enrolled in clinical trials. “Until now, recruitment and qualification for trials depended largely on a patient accurately recalling their own medical information,” explains Michael, CEO of iPatientAxis. “But obtaining accurate information is challenging for sites that are often overburdened with administrative tasks.” This is where iPatientAxis comes in. The iPatientAxis team has years of experience initiating medical record review requests through to completion which includes custom screening and aggregation tools. The application of real-world data in this setting expedites the initial patient screening process in order to maximize the chances that the potential participate will enroll.

Research sites, pharmaceutical companies and contract research organizations are the three legs of the clinical trial tool. The sponsor awards trials to CROs based on a number of factors including site relationships and access. But often a CRO will underestimate the number of sites needed to find enrollment success while a site will overestimate the number of patients in their database meeting eligibility criteria. By using real-world data, which iPatientAxis uniquely owns and has proprietary capabilities to access and index, any guessing around the location of ideal patients is eliminated. This informs solid site location planning.

The offerings of iPatientAxis are first, EMR Record Review, Aggregation and Validation. Here automated data analysis and closed-loop record digitizing and transmission enables sites to screen potential study volunteers in an effective, efficient manner. Secondly, the company’s site network with over 6,000 practices and their patients augments existing recruitment intelligence. Thirdly, a feasibility service applying a protocol’s eligibility criteria against the company’s real-world data repository of 18 million de-identified patient records helps support marketing strategies and provides insight around the expected rate of enrollment.

iPatientAxis has been busy assisting clients worldwide to achieve their goals. As one example, a global patient recruitment firm contacted iPatientAxis to learn how its services might benefit a variety of studies requiring medical records to inform the screening process. Working with the recruitment firm, iPatientAxis created an easy-to-use digital patient authorization form to reduce the number of patients failing to complete the previous form. Once this form is completed by a patient, it is submitted to iPatientAxis. Next the company’s qualified records professionals start the data aggregation process immediately using a tried and tested approach. Once information from the source healthcare providers is received by the services team, it is both verified and indexed. From here iPatientAxis' unique automated clinical factor analysis also helps evaluate the potential fit of the patient. Results are digitally transmitted from iPatientAxis to the actual site screening the patient. This closed-loop system virtually eliminates paper records and any associated lag time. The net results? A significant uptick in enrollment, up to a 500% improvement for some trials.

Looking forward, iPatientAxis is focused on expanding its platform capabilities to provide more value to customers, specifically, deriving deeper intelligence from the clinical data that has been accumulated from participants. “As one part of our roadmap, we are working closely with several artificial intelligence partners to develop a learning system that can provide deeper insights, analytics and next level of predictive outcomes based on our cache of real-world clinical data,” says Michael.