Medical technology company Smith+Nephew and Huma Therapeutics, a digital health company, have shown themselves to be successful partners across several therapeutic areas using an array of different digital solutions.
Together, they have created a joint mission – that life shouldn’t be limited by any health condition, and all people and patients should be able to live longer, fuller lives.
Smith+Nephew, who focus on the repair, regeneration and replacement of soft and hard tissue, identified a series of orthopaedic use cases that they believed could be improved by using data more effectively. Using unique and inventive ways of transforming the available data into new insights, they built up a personalised view of each patient to enable the best possible care.
Smith+Nephew is aiming to maximise the value of these previously hidden insights by using the latest digital solutions, by combining historical data from existing data sources, alongside continuous, real-time data points.
Working alongside, Huma is providing the digital technology to create an app – which will assist in the management of patients undergoing knee (and hip) replacement surgery in multiple global sites.
Better prepared for surgery
Before a knee operation, information is required to understand a person’s range of motion (ROM). Knee flexion and extension range of motion is necessary for functional and sport specific activities, and by understanding any limitations before the operation, it allows for a clear progress level to be determined post-operation. Preoperative range of motion (flexibility) is the best predictor of postoperative outcome.
Traditionally, range of knee joint motion is assessed either visually by health professionals or with a hand-held goniometer. But this method ties up healthcare staff and increases costs.
Now, using Huma’s AI (Artificial Intelligence) driven platform, remote monitoring is possible with Huma’s Peri-Op solution which has two parts: a patient app and a web-based portal for surgical teams.
Huma’s Peri-Op solution: the patient app
For the patient, Huma’s Peri-Op app is like having a digital consultant in their pocket, providing accurate information when they need it, with the reassurance that someone is looking out for them every step of the way.
Patients can use their mobile phone at home, to record and track their ROM using Huma’s Peri-Op app, using phone cameras to record their knee movements and provide an objective reading. This AI technology can also see compensatory movements that may be missed with a human eye.
The patient app also provides timed educational content, activity tracking, and in-licensed questionnaires to ensure patients are optimised pre-op and provided with increased support post-op.
Before surgery, the app gathers digital data and patient inputs, to establish a baseline of their overall health. Patients receive pre-surgery guidance, access virtual rehabilitation resources and can have video calls with their surgical team. Meanwhile, clinicians can use the health data to check if patients will be well enough for the surgery.
Huma’s Peri-Op solution: web-based portal for surgical teams
This data is then provided to the clinician and used as part of a personalised patient profile, or Knee Registry. The web-based portal provides aggregated, anonymised real-world data that can be used to correlate outcomes with the type of knee implant, surgery, and rehabilitation approach to support further improvements in clinical care.
Data continues to be collected post-operatively, to give the orthopaedic consultant a better idea of overall patient progress. Based on the data gathered, the post-surgical care team can quickly intervene if necessary. For example, to bring the patient in for an examination, adjust medication, or provide positive feedback and encouragement.
Previous work[i] has shown the positive impact that better preparation can have on patients, such as reducing recovery time by an average of one day, identifying higher risk patients to enable closer monitoring of their recovery, and infection prevention reducing the rate of 30-day re-admissions. Other benefits include the ability to educate patients around the main topics that could cause the most anxiety.
About Huma
Huma’s award-winning modular platforms are used by more than 3,000 hospitals and clinics, with over 1.8 million active users in healthcare and over 700,000 participants across research. Huma’s technology covers:
- virtual care tools ranging from digital-first screening and population health initiatives to at-scale remote patient monitoring (RPM)
- companion apps to support patients through treatment and drug therapies
- digital clinical trials, including decentralised trials, to accelerate medical research
Huma’s regulated Software as a Medical Device, used in its RPM and companion app platforms, is the only disease and device diagnostic platform to hold EU MDR Class IIb, US FDA 510(k) Class II clearance and Class IIb registration with the UK MHRA. The SaMD platform is regulated to accept AI algorithms and monitor patients of all ages.
For further information on Huma’s solutions, download the free paper below.
[i] https://info.huma.com/periop-solution
