Cigna AI Product Identifies People Who Skip Medicines -- WSJ
December 13 2019 - 3:02AM
Dow Jones News
By Agam Shah
This article is being republished as part of our daily
reproduction of WSJ.com articles that also appeared in the U.S.
print edition of The Wall Street Journal (December 13, 2019).
Cigna Corp. plans to expand a system that uses artificial
intelligence to identify gaps in treatment of chronic diseases,
such as patients skipping their medications, and deliver
personalized recommendations for specific patients.
The product, called Health Connect 360, integrates data from a
combination of sources and analytical tools, some developed at
Cigna and others brought in as part of its $54 billion acquisition
of pharmacy-benefit manager Express Scripts Holding Co., completed
late last year. Express Scripts, which began developing the service
two years ago, rolled out portions of it to some customers this
year.
The complete system will be available next month to all
customers of Express Scripts and Cigna that offer health benefits
to employees, the company said.
Health Connect 360 was developed for treatment of chronic
diseases, including diabetes and heart disease, as well as for pain
management. The system aggregates medical, pharmacy, lab and
biometric data -- such as information from glucometers, which
measure blood-sugar levels -- into a dashboard that is accessible
through an online interface. The dashboard will be visible to the
service's customers and to Express Scripts case managers and nurses
with access rights. The system can also feed information to
electronic-medical record systems for physicians.
More health-care organizations are looking to artificial
intelligence to spot diseases, prioritize cases and improve patient
outcomes -- results that also have the effect of lowering overall
costs for the providers.
AI systems' ability to learn from an array of patient histories,
medical tests and diagnostic tests makes them ideal tools for care.
However, getting access to health data required for better outcomes
can be a bottleneck.
"That was our concept around the acquisition of Express Scripts
-- it was much more than just simply buying a pharmacy-benefits
management [company]. It was buying a set of care-management
capabilities, and access to data and intelligence that would be
very, very hard to replicate," said Cigna Chief Information Officer
Mark Boxer, who drives the company's AI deployment.
Cigna is already using AI to predict whether patients might
abuse or overdose on prescription opioids. Another Cigna tool, One
Guide, provides personalized help to health-insurance holders on
their benefit plans, appointments and health coaching.
The new Health Connect 360 system combines algorithms that
analyze data such as clinical and pharmacy information with
predictive models to generate recommendations and ways to best
engage a patient, whether through an app or in person.
For example, collected data from pharmacy claims or high blood
glucose level readings from connected glucometers could trigger an
alert in Health Connect 360 that a diabetic patient needs help to
stay on track with medications.
After the system was tested and partially deployed this year,
early results showed success in helping diabetic patients, the
company said.
Managing chronic conditions is much less expensive than engaging
in some kind of corrective procedure, said Matthew Josefowicz,
chief executive of research and advisory firm Novarica Inc.
"Across the health-care industry, as with every industry, the
incredible growth in data availability and ability to communicate
enables new kinds of interventions that were just too
cost-prohibitive to even consider before," Mr. Josefowicz said.
To keep the focus on its core health business, Cigna recently
has been seeking a buyer for a unit that sells life, accident and
disability-income insurance to employers for their workers, The
Wall Street Journal reported Tuesday.
Write to Agam Shah at agam.shah@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
December 13, 2019 02:47 ET (07:47 GMT)
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