Instead of taking the obvious track of replacing the hip in case of patient complaints, the patient-centric approach consists of involving the patient in his personal trajectory, from start to finish, and involving him or her in the decision to go for a surgery or following the conventional road with kine exercises. Based on years of historical patient trajectory data, each patient can be projected various different pathways, allowing him or her to make a well-considered decision with a clear view on the expected outcome. This personalized care divers dramatically from a traditional one-size-fits-all approach, which often fails to consider individual patient parameters such as pain thresholds, mobility levels, and overall health condition.
Dr. prof. Kristoff Corten of orthopedic Surgeon of the European Hip Center & ZOL Genk faced the challenge of building close communication loops with his patients in order to have all necessary input to optimize the patient trajectory to his or her expectations. The primary hurdle was the lack of a system to incorporate patient-specific data into patient trajectories and recovery plans, limiting their ability to provide truly personalized care and exercises tailored to each patient's journey. Usually, the standard procedure for a hip complaint is surgery, which involves replacing the hip. This is an expensive procedure (including for society) that is not always necessary. Avoiding surgery through proper guidance (physical therapy, nutrition, psychologist,...) can be an advantageous solution for the patient, the doctor and society alike.
Hipcloud introduced a revolutionary data-driven platform, empowering the hip surgeon and the hip coach to elaborate optimized patient treatment strategies. This platform gathers and analyzes individual patient data, maps this on a large historical big data warehouse of patient pathways and uses datamodels and algorithms to generate personalized insights that enable them to fine-tune the treatment and exercises to each patient's unique needs. In addition, the HipCloud also wants to ensure that, in case surgery is unavoidable, the patient is optimally prepared for the procedure in order to make the recovery afterwards as short and pain-free as possible. To convince the patient to join the proposed trajectory, the HipCloud must be able to visually represent the evolution with reference to similar patient trajectories in the past. That way, there is an objective, scientific basis that the medical team can use to convince the patient and also follow up during the trajectory. Crucial in this process is the close communication with the patient who must have a direct link with the hipcoach to assist and support him with any question throughout the trajectory. In order to do so, a chat functionality is also built-in in the hipcloud application.
This approach significantly enhanced the treatment experience for hip surgery patients, offering a path to quicker, more comfortable recovery tailored to their personal health parameters. The platform fostered a deeper collaboration between patients and the hip surgeon's team, ensuring care plans are both effective and aligned with patients' capacities and goals. The HipCloud web application is primarily used by the hip coach and surgeon to:
In addition, the hipcloud is also the patient's resource during the treatment process. Here he can find all the information about his treatment program, the procedure itself, his exercises throughout the program, communication with the hip coach, etc. The HipCloud is also the channel through which patient feedback can be captured at any time during the program.
In the future, there are possibilities to extend this project to other pathologies. Since the concept of data-driven treatments can add value to various medical fields.
Hipcloud's initiative stands as a testament to the power of innovative technology in transforming patient care. Together, they have set a new benchmark for personalized healthcare, particularly in the realm of post-operative recovery, by prioritizing patient-specific data and care customization.
Codana and EpicData are our implementation partners in the hipcloud project. Codana focuses on the implementation of the hipCloud platform, while Epicdata uses its experience in data to build the data warehouse in the cloud on top of the Microsoft Azure platform.
VZN Federated Data Network