What You Should Know:
– Nebraska Medicine, the clinical partner of the University of Nebraska Medical Center, achieved a nearly 6x increase in lung cancer risk assessment completion through a collaboration with CancerIQ, a best-in-class cancer-focused precision health platform.
– The results of the lung cancer early detection campaign, which focused on risk assessment outside of the clinical setting, will be presented at the upcoming Association of Cancer Care Centers (ACCC) National Oncology Conference.
Nebraska Medicine and CancerIQ Partner to Drive Early Cancer Detection Through Precision Health
CancerIQ, a pioneering cancer-focused precision health platform, empowers healthcare providers to detect and prevent cancer across all patient populations. By integrating directly into real-time EHR workflows, CancerIQ enables the seamless collection of comprehensive patient data, automatic mapping to the latest evidence-based guidelines, and expanded access to personalized care plans, cutting-edge clinical solutions, and genomic innovations. CancerIQ’s co-founder and CEO, Feyi Ayodele, was recently recognized as a Modern Healthcare Innovator for her work in transforming cancer prevention, early detection, and treatment.
In 2023, supported by CancerIQ, Nebraska Medicine launched a lung cancer early detection campaign targeting patients with a history of smoking. The two-month program used patient portal messages, emails, and fliers to encourage these patients to complete a cancer risk assessment.
Key outcomes from the campaign include:
– A 29% response rate, a marked improvement from the 5-6% achieved in previous campaigns.
– Patients who completed the risk assessment received personalized education and action plans tailored to support early detection and prevention.
– 30.3% of respondents were eligible for a low-dose CT scan and shared decision-making appointment, while 41.3% were eligible for additional preventive services such as high-risk breast screening or genetic testing.
– Four patients were diagnosed with Stage 1A lung cancer, which offers significantly higher five-year survival rates compared to later-stage diagnoses.
Following the success of this outreach, Nebraska Medicine expanded the program to include in-person risk assessments at community events, additional outreach to at-risk patients, and implementation in other clinical settings, such as colon cancer screening. The health system continues to collaborate with CancerIQ as the program evolves.
“Lung cancer remains the leading cause of cancer-related deaths in Nebraska, yet screening rates for at-risk patients are only 3.7% due to the complexity of screening guidelines and difficulties in accessing up-to-date patient history,” explained Rachael Schmidt, Program Director for Cancer Survivorship & Cancer Risk at Nebraska Medicine. “CancerIQ provided the technology and expertise to efficiently identify eligible patients, conduct targeted outreach, and assess their need for additional services based on risk assessment responses—without overwhelming our IT and marketing teams.”