Impact of Predictive Modeling on Time to Palliative Care in an Outpatient Primary Care Population

Mayo Clinic

Status: Completed

Conditions: Palliative Care

Treatments: Other: Palliative care contacts primary care

Study type: Interventional

Funder types: Other

Identifiers

NCT04604457

20-005977

Details and patient eligibility

About

A machine learning algorithm will be used to accurately identify patients in certain primary care units who may benefit from palliative care consults.

Full description

A machine learning algorithm will be used to accurately identify patients in certain primary care units who may benefit from palliative care consults. These patients will be presented weekly to a palliative care specialist in a custom user interface. The palliative care specialist will reach out to primary care teams if she determines that the patient would benefit from palliative care. If the primary care provider agrees, he/she would write a palliative care consult order for the patient. The goal is to reduce the time to palliative care for these patients, who may not have been identified as quickly without the algorithm.

Enrollment: 127,070 patients

Sex: All

Ages: 18+ years old

Volunteers: No Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion criteria

• Adult patient assigned to a primary care unit from July 2020 to June 2021.
• Weekly the palliative care specialists will select patients by looking at patients in sorted order starting with the highest score and proceeding down the list and evaluating each patient for exclusion criteria.

Exclusion criteria

• Patients that have been seen by Palliative care will be excluded for 75 days
• Patients under the age of 18 years.
• Patients currently enrolled with hospice

Trial design

Primary purpose: Screening

Allocation: Randomized

Interventional model: Crossover Assignment

Masking: None (Open label)

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127,070 participants in 2 patient groups

Standard of Care

No Intervention group

Description:

Palliative care specialists would not reach out to primary care providers. Palliative care needs would be met via existing mechanisms.

Predictive Model

Experimental group

Description:

Palliative care specialists review recommendations from the predictive model and contact a patient's primary care provider (PCP) when appropriate to recommend a palliative care consult.

Treatment:

Other: Palliative care contacts primary care