Adventist Health Expands Partnership with CancerIQ in Effort to Reduce Hereditary Cancer Deaths

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• USA - English

ROSEVILLE, Calif., May 22, 2019 /PRNewswire-PRWeb/ -- Adventist Health, a health system serving more than 80 communities on the West Coast and in Hawaii, today announced it is expanding its partnership with CancerIQ as part of a system-wide effort to reduce hereditary cancer deaths and improve population health. The CancerIQ cancer risk assessment and management platform will be integrated into the health system's Cerner Electronic Health Record (EHR) to streamline a multi-specialty rollout across the health system. Providers and patients will now be armed with the genetic information they need to make optimal, personalized care decisions.

"We are excited to deepen our partnership with CancerIQ to help ensure our patients – in both urban and rural settings – have access to the highest standards of care and the preventive services they need to reduce hereditary cancer risk," said Lisa Fowler, Director, Ambulatory Clinical Quality Integration at Adventist Health. "We are ready to build on the improvements we've seen since partnering with CancerIQ, including the clinical management of patients at increased risk for hereditary cancer, as well as providing an opportunity for in-depth conversations with patients about routine cancer screening."

Hereditary cancers, which tend to be earlier onset and more aggressive, account for up to 10% of new diagnoses. Genetic testing can help identify at-risk patients so that appropriate preventive measures can be taken to preempt or prevent the disease.

CancerIQ's technology makes it easier for providers to identify, evaluate and manage entire patient populations based on individual genetic risk factors, all within the existing EHR workflow. By analyzing family history, running predictive risk models, and automating National Comprehensive Cancer Network (NCCN®) Clinical Practice Guidelines in Oncology (NCCN Guidelines®), CancerIQ empowers providers with the genetic expertise to prevent cancer or catch it earlier.

"Supported by the CancerIQ technology, Adventist Health will now be able to identify candidates for genetic testing, offer education and testing, and provide counseling across the network and various care settings – including primary care, obstetrics and gynecology, breast imaging, gastroenterology, and oncology," said Candace Westgate, MD, director of the Adventist Health Early All-Around Detection (AHEAD) Program at Adventist Health, a population hereditary cancer risk assessment initiative.

When patients are identified as high-risk, CancerIQ helps to make sure they receive the right preventive care at the right time. The platform navigates high-risk patients to Adventist Health's regional "circles of care," which are formed by Adventist Health's specialty groups—including gynecology, urology, oncology/hematology, dermatology, breast surgery, GI, and psychology—to improve care coordination and drive better outcomes. These specialty groups offer enhanced cancer screening services such as breast MRI, and if appropriate – perform preventive surgeries that can reduce cancer risk altogether.

"I received genetic testing and counseling in my ob/gyn's office, and learned I had an 87% chance of getting breast cancer and 60-70% chance of getting ovarian cancer," said Brenda Munson. "These were just too high of numbers for me to live with, so I opted to have preventive surgeries. I'm really lucky because I was able to make decisions based on having these statistics. Now, I'm living a full life with my husband and young boys, and I have a significant amount of peace of mind."

For patients at average risk, undergoing the genetic evaluation process has made cancer prevention more top of mind and improved mammography and colonoscopy screening rates.

Clinics that have implemented the genetic cancer screening through its AHEAD program demonstrate dramatically higher rates of routine cancer screening for all of their patients. For the vast majority of patients at average risk, this promotes early detection when cancers are most curable.

"Our work serving over nearly 8,000 patients at Adventist Health over the past 18 months has demonstrated that genetic screening is a true win-win for all parties involved. The investment Adventist has made in technology and clinical education has paid off for the health system, its providers, and more importantly – its patients." said Feyi Olopade Ayodele, co-founder and CEO of CancerIQ. "Adventist leadership is ensuring that genetic testing is not only a part of their innovation and specialty service line development strategy, but a foundational part of their quality assurance, patient safety, and population health management initiatives."

About Adventist Health

Adventist Health is a faith-based, nonprofit integrated health system serving more than 80 communities on the West Coast and Hawaii. Founded on Seventh-day Adventist heritage and values, Adventist Health provides care in hospitals, clinics, home care agencies, hospice agencies and joint-venture retirement centers in both rural and urban communities. Our compassionate and talented team of 35,000 includes associates, medical staff physicians, allied health professionals and volunteers driven in pursuit of one mission: living God's love by inspiring health, wholeness and hope. Together, we are transforming the American healthcare experience with an innovative, yet timeless, whole-person focus on physical, mental, spiritual and social healing.

About CancerIQ

CancerIQ's technology enables hospitals to identify, evaluate and manage entire patient populations based on individual genetic risk factors. By analyzing family history, running predictive risk models and automating NCCN guidelines, CancerIQ empowers community-based providers with the genetic expertise to prevent cancer or catch it early. The platform has been rapidly adopted by some of the top health systems in the country and fully integrates with genetics laboratories, EHRs, and specialty software vendors to streamline workflow, guide clinician decision making, achieve cost savings, and – most importantly – improve patient outcomes. Learn more about how CancerIQ is scaling the use of genetic testing to predict, preempt and prevent disease at canceriq.com.

SOURCE CancerIQ