Cambia Health Solutions and GNS Healthcare to Co-Develop Next Generation Medication Adherence Platform Using Big Data Analytics

PORTLAND, Ore. and CAMBRIDGE, Mass., June 27, 2013 /PRNewswire/ --  Cambia Health Solutions and GNS Healthcare today announced they are collaborating to build a platform for harnessing data-driven predictive models focused on medication adherence. The partnership will focus on predicting Meaningful Adherence™ – identifying where improving medication adherence can have the most meaningful impact on clinical and cost outcomes.

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The Cambia family of companies includes leading health plans across the Northwest and Intermountain regions. The platform's models will use real-world data provided by the health plans to determine the following:

• Highly-individualized predictions of which specific medications, if not taken sufficiently, are most likely to cause adverse outcomes
• What modifiable factors, if changed, could improve adherence the most
• Which members are or will soon be most at risk

Poor medication adherence is defined as patients not taking their medications as prescribed or in some cases, not taking them at all. It has significant and wide- ranging cost impacts on the health care system. According to a meta-analysis published October 7, 2012 in The Annals of Internal Medicine poor medication adherence is estimated to be responsible for between $100-$289 billion in annual healthcare costs, 33% of medication-related hospital admissions, between 30-50% of treatment failures, and 125,000 deaths each year. Low medication adherence is especially a problem for those with chronic disease, and the problem will only get worse, as the number of people with at least one chronic condition is expected to grow to 157 million by 2020, according to the Centers for Disease Control.

"The burdens from poor medication adherence, both to individuals and to the healthcare system as a whole, are enormous, but addressing them is absolutely within our reach," said Carol McCall, Chief Strategy Officer at GNS. "In fact, some organizations have called improving patient adherence 'the next frontier in patient care.' Our Meaningful Adherence™ platform is creating a unique set of capabilities that help make patient adherence a reality by making it possible to accelerate the development of highly individualized, data-driven and evidence-based innovations that improve adherence and create the most value."

The Meaningful Adherence™ platform will harness GNS's REFS™ modeling framework. Using REFS™ to learn models of the underlying relationships in the data, the platform can make individualized predictions of when higher adherence is vital.

"Cambia is committed to identifying innovations that support our vision for an economically sustainable health care system. We are excited to take this significant step forward by partnering with GNS to make this vision a reality," said Richard Popiel, M.D., Executive Vice President of Health Care Services and Chief Medical Officer for Cambia Health Solutions. "For the first time, we'll be able to directly pinpoint relationships between medication adherence and medical costs and create tailored clinical programs that will help improve members' health and lower their overall health care costs."

About GNS Healthcare
GNS Healthcare is a big data analytics company that has developed a scalable approach for the discovery of what works in healthcare, and for whom. Our analytics solutions are being applied across the healthcare industry: from pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies, health plans and hospitals, to integrated delivery systems, pharmacy benefits managers, and accountable care organizations. Whether your organization is delivering care or developing personalized therapies and diagnostics, GNS Healthcare can help you discover the knowledge you need to match patients with treatments that work.

About Cambia Health Solutions
Cambia Health Solutions is a nonprofit total health solutions company based in the Pacific Northwest/Intermountain region, serving consumers and communities for nearly 100 years.  Cambia companies provide a wide range of products and services, including healthcare information technology and software development, retail healthcare, health insurance plans, life insurance, pharmacy benefit management, consumer engagement and wellness. For more information, please visit www.cambiahealthsolutions.com. 

SOURCE GNS Healthcare