Community Cancer Center Benefits from Closing Care Gaps with AI-Automated Patient Navigation

Patient Navigation Automation

Since September 2024, NYCBS has been using the Agamon Health Coordinate Platform at 41 locations to manage the following two clinical cohorts:

1. General Imaging Follow-ups
2. High-Risk Breast Cancer Patients eligible for breast MRI based on their risk score.

During this time, NYCBS has automated the following workflows for these patients:

1. Identify patients in their medical reports and EHR with gaps in their care by using advanced AI to analyze their medical reports and clinical notes.
2. Automate the tracking, matching, and communication with internal and external referring providers and their patients.
3. Improve early diagnosis and care coordination, ensuring that prescribed follow-up care occurs per plan so patients receive timely treatment.

The automated alerts and patient communications that are part of the Coordinate Platform have improved patient follow-up adherence, reduced medical errors, and enhanced continuity of care. Patients enrolled in NYCBS screening programs and those receiving treatment now benefit from a more timely follow-up because Agamon Health provides a safety net that ensures they don’t fall through the cracks.

Agamon Health has also helped NYCBS clinical staff coordinate care across clinical teams at different sites to ensure they retain patients who need ongoing cancer surveillance, yet receive that care at various locations.

NYCBS has also established more efficient communication processes, whereby staff manually calls a patient only if they have missed three automated call-backs. This enables NYCBS to use its internal resources much more efficiently.

“Agamon Health automation is revolutionizing our operations by helping us improve the quality of the patient care we deliver,” says Dr. Vacirca. He continues, “It also enhances our ability to efficiently deliver care while capturing more patient referrals.”

Since implementing Agamon Health, NYCBS has enhanced its referral coordination, eliminating the need for patient navigation resources at every location. NYCBS is better able to get patients to the correct external referring physician and then have them return to NYCBS for follow-up care, ensuring patients are not lost during these transitions.

Immediate and Significant Benefits

During this time, NYCBS realized the following operational and financial benefits:

General radiology patients:

• 28% more patients returned for recommended follow-up care, translating into a projected $600K in new annual revenue.
• Saved approximately $100K (annualized) in clinical staff costs.

High-risk breast cancer patients:

• Identified these patients and notified their referring physician of their eligibility for breast MRI.
• 47% of these patients completed their breast MRI.
• Generated additional revenue from breast MRIs and Interventional Radiology procedures.

These improvements enabled NYCBS to realize a 6X Return On Investment (ROI) within three months of going live with the Agamon Health Coordinate Platform and dramatically improve the quality of the diagnostic and treatment services provided.

NYCBS has 13 different clinical service lines and has since expanded its use of Agamon Health to other Interventional Radiology programs such as Uterine Fibroid Embolization, Prostate Artery Embolization, and Kyphoplasty.  These efforts enable NYCBS to keep all these patients in-house. NYCBS also plans to roll out Agamon Health to OBGYN, Endocrinology, and other clinical service lines.

NYCBS expects to ultimately generate enough incremental revenue and cost savings to achieve a 10x return on investment (ROI) from working with Agamon Health.