Our Featured Publication with CU Boulder’s CANLab

CANLab Publication

Our partners at the University of Colorado Boulder’s Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience Lab (CANLab) feature our collaboration with their most recent publication.

The Publication

Featured in Neurotherapeutics, the CANLab researchers explore the application of machine learning to chronic pain assessments, leveraging emotional body maps powered by the cliexa platform. With emotional and behavioral health as cornerstones of their chronic pain research, the study explores the emotional processing associated with body sensations. Remote patient outcomes reporting for the study was built into our integrated pain management platform, cliexa-EASE.

The study consisted of sixty-five chronic back pain patients, of whom reported their pain intensity and its’ location on an interactive body map. This focus on patient-reported data aligns with cliexa’s vision of placing the patient at the center of their care journey. With these metrics, the team leveraged two separate machine learning models to predict future pain levels two weeks in advance.

The CANLab’s Initial Findings

The CANLab’s initial findings were deduced as two separate models. One model ignored pain-related features as predictive measures of future pain with the second factoring in existing levels of pain. The contribution of emotions, especially emotional experiences felt by the patients, impacted chronic pain levels considerably. With these findings, they believe these results could contribute to the generation of a novel artificial intelligence model to assist in the diagnosis and treatment approaches to chronic back pain. Read the complete publication here.

Future Collaborations and Research

Our collaboration with the CANLab is one of many ways we strive to innovate in the clinical research space. With artificial intelligence moving into the forefront of modern healthcare, we are continually searching for further areas to drive innovation in the medical field. If you are interested in exploring some of our research partnership opportunities, please Contact Us for further details.

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Tune in to the Who Would Have Thought – Digital Health Podcast

Who Would Have Thought - Digital Health Podcast

cliexa’s CEO & Founder, Mehmet Kazgan, is featured in the Who Would Have Thought – Digital Health Innovation Podcast! The Who Would Have Thought – Digital Health Innovation Podcast host, Robert Niichel, CEO and Founder of SmartTab, was joined by Chief Marketing Officer, Sacha Heppell.

In this episode, we take a deep dive into the value of patient-reported data and how cliexa leverages artificial intelligence (AI) to drive innovation in healthcare. Let’s take a look at the interview topics:

1. Improving Crohn’s Disease Outcomes

With any chronic disease, patients should be at the center of their own care. Our goal is to empower patients to guide their own care journey through real-time symptom reporting at the tip of their fingers. The cliexa-IBD platform embodies this approach by collecting information in-between visits to provide physicians a comprehensive overview of day-to-day symptoms experienced by their patients.

2. Patient-Centered Platforms vs. Tools for Physicians

Applications that benefit both the patient and physician journeys are critical to successful digital health tools. We subdivide our platform by two separate segments: Patient Profile and Diagnostic Profile. While the patient profile remains stagnant based on past medical and family history, the diagnostic profile is highly influenced by real-time symptoms experienced by the patient and has a large effect on their changing treatment plan. Check out our solutions for more information!

3. Data in Healthcare

The fourth industrial revolution is here, and data is at the forefront of innovation. For healthcare, the power of data is seen every day with each new discovery surrounding COVID-19. Digital health puts actionable data in the hands of clinical professionals and researchers to collect real data from patients and put it to use in defining their personalized treatment plans.

4. The Future of AI in Healthcare

Further building on how data will change modern healthcare, artificial intelligence accelerates the rate at which we identify trends in patient-reported data. With AI at the forefront of innovation, cliexa is proud to be implementing our proprietary model into chronic pain settings. Stay tuned for more information on our opioid risk AI model.

Thanks to Robert and Sacha for hosting cliexa on the Who Would Have Thought – Digital Health Innovation Podcast. We enjoyed the mindful discussion surrounding patient-reported outcomes and the future of AI in modern healthcare. Tune in to the podcast for more information on how cliexa is reinventing the way medical conditions are managed!

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Recapping the UX & Telehealth RapidConf Event

Telehealth and user experience

Bene Studio RapidConf Event Recap

cliexa was a proud exhibitor for the UX & Telehealth RapidConf as a part of their COVID-19 Crisis Workshop! Joining technology leaders from around the world, our team became a part of the conversation on the importance of UX design in telehealth.

The Role of UX in Digital Health

This year has been a game changer for digital health technologies, with telehealth and telemedicine being at the forefront of every clinical practice. With the rapid deployment of technologies, it’s critical to acknowledge how user experience (UX) plays a role in a patient’s healthcare journey. Designing a user-friendly application or web interface is critical to engaging patient’s in their treatment and is where UX plays a huge role in these novel technologies. With the shift to patient-driven healthcare, there is the need to instill new habits to make interacting with the technology a part of their routine.

Our team has emphasized the importance of UX/UI design on the patient journey over the recent months. While our platform primarily gears towards clinicians and medical staff, patients must have their own intuitive interface. Check out our virtual health solution to visualize the UX design work we have implemented as healthcare goes digital.

A huge thank you to Bene Studio for having us as an exhibitor and to all of the panelists that took part in the event!

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Digital Tools that Help Patients Where They Are

Digital Health Tools

Digital Health at the Forefront

Over the past few days, healthcare professionals and industry leaders across the nation are suggesting that our healthcare environment is more akin to rural care than ever before. Given the state of our rural care in the United States, this proves to be challenging for healthcare systems to adopt novel technologies that curb the challenges of virtual care. With patients less likely to pursue care for major issues throughout this pandemic, digital interventions are more desirable than ever.

In a recent interview with McKinsey & Company and CVS Caremark’s president, Alan Lotvin, Mr. Lotvin highlights their shift to in-home models and nontraditional care during the COVID-19 pandemic. One of the larger topics discussed was how patients and physicians are working to understand the risk of avoidable emergency department visits, and how they can effectively use digital tools, like telehealth and telemedicine, to run parts of the clinical practice. Additionally, the avoidance of care persists as a valid concern across healthcare systems, as people with comorbidities are at higher risk for severe COVID-19 complications.

Our Response

It shouldn’t come as a surprise that telehealth and telemedicine have come into the forefront of the digital health conversation. As Mr. Lotvin discussed, “telehealth and telemedicine are huge right now… I think most doctors have found that there are effective ways to run big parts of their practice.” The importance of telehealth and other digital interventions emphasizes the need for tools like cliexa in clinical practices. cliexa’s own virtual care solutions were significantly expanded in response to the needs of client clinics within weeks of the onset of the coronavirus pandemic, which integrates seamlessly into the other product offerings.

With industry leaders promoting the value of digital interventions, full-stack virtual health solutions continue to prove their long-term value in healthcare. Check out our latest blog as we discuss how the Access to Care in Rural Settings remains a challenge in the United States and continues to be an obstacle during the coronavirus pandemic.

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An Update to Global Health Going Digital

Gender Equity in Global Health

Back in January of 2020, our own Director of Product, Ashley Darnell, shared about her experience and recent manuscript publication with FHI360’s Alive and Thrive Program in Vietnam. Since then, Darnell’s time and research have obtained further publication in a second manuscript that delves deeper into the varying health policies in Southeast Asia and their subsequent effects on the region. Check out her most recent update below!

“In 2020, the impact of varying health policies when addressing a common goal is undeniable. However, in 2017 when I began working alongside the Alive & Thrive team in Vietnam, a sector focused on maternal and child health within with FHI360, an in-depth comparative policy assessment of National Nutrition Strategies across ASEAN had not been conducted. As outlined in the manuscript, “Countries in Southeast Asia have high burdens of malnutrition (Association of Southeast Asian Nations [ASEAN], European Union, UNICEF, & World Health Organization [WHO], 2016; UNICEF, 2019). For example, in the region’s 11 countries, nine have a high or very high prevalence of stunting (≥20%), nine have medium, high, or very high prevalence of wasting (≥5%), and five countries have medium, high, or very high prevalence of overweight (≥5%) among children under 5 years of age (UNICEF, 2019). The prevalence of children under 5 suffering from micronutrient deficiencies in Southeast Asia is almost 50% (ASEAN et al., 2016; UNICEF, 2019). Rates of malnutrition among school‐aged children and women are also high in this region (UNICEF, 2019). Seven of the 11 Southeast Asian countries belong to the lowest 20th percentile of height for men and women among 129 countries (N. C. D. Risk Factor Collaboration, 2016),1” presenting a valuable opportunity to review the policies in place at a national level in 9 Asian countries as they compare to regional and international recommendations.”

“At Alive & Thrive, we scrupulously analyzed the existing policies for Vietnam, Myanmar, Cambodia, Brunei, Malaysia, Laos, Timor Leste, Indonesia, and the Philippines. We assessed the context and objectives of all existing health interventions relating to maternal and child nutrition to identify how closely aligned these national efforts were. The outcome was recently published in the Journal of Maternal and Child Nutrition, titled National nutrition strategies that focus on maternal, infant, and young child nutrition in Southeast Asia do not consistently align with regional and international recommendations.”

“In this manuscript, we found that despite the continued alignment of ASEAN countries in regional efforts, the NNS did not consistently align when it came to maternal and child health interventions. We proposed that establishing a database of health intervention information on a regional and international level would not only help cross-check for effectiveness when correlating with other national statistics but also help increase alignment and overall knowledge in the application of health intervention through policy structures.”

Join us in congratulating Ashley in her accomplishments in Public Health, and check out the manuscript in the citation below.

1 Nguyen, TT, Darnell, A, Weissman, A, et al. National nutrition strategies that focus on maternal, infant, and young child nutrition in Southeast Asia do not consistently align with regional and international recommendations. Matern Child Nutr. 2020;e12937. https://doi.org/10.1111/mcn.12937

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