moveUP
Personalisation is Paramount for Value-Based Healthcare

The business world abounds with phrases such as ‘chance encounters’–that often lead to breakthrough discoveries. A similar ‘chance encounter’ led to the conception of moveUP—a company that offers a state-of-the-art digital therapeutics platform solution for personalised patient journeys. Back in 2015, when Ward Servaes, an engineer in the field of consumer electronics, was in an MBA assignment with his batchmate, he met an orthopaedic surgeon who joined their team. This encounter was nothing less than an eye-opener for both Servaes and his batchmate, as the surgeon revealed the problems faced in healthcare pertaining to missing patient information or insights.

Five years since, the challenges have only aggravated. While the number of patients requiring total knee and hip replacement continues, meeting patient demands in a diminishing surgeon workforce has become a big hurdle. Statistically, in the OECD countries, especially in Europe, 140 arthroplasty surgeries are performed every 100,000 inhabitants, which is around 2 million cases per year, but up to 30 percent of patients end up dissatisfied, mostly because of the 15-20 percent incidence of the chronic pain. This happens due to the rise of high variability in the standard of care on the course of the pre- and post-surgery, despite the surgery being standardised itself. Additionally, the changes sweeping the healthcare industry has left many orthopaedic surgeons unsure of how to proceed.

Servaes and his batchmate realised that the application of digital technologies to enable mobile health, could not just tackle the issues the surgeon mentioned, but also bring in extra opportunities and value for the surgeon, patient and other stakeholders of the ecosystem. The duo co-founded moveUP to directly provide or let the healthcare professionals offer a hundred percent personalised treatment to every patient.

With an ardent focus on patient engagement, moveUP is an expert in digital therapeutics offering a whole range of patient pathway solutions through companion, coaching and live monitoring. “Our uniqueness lies in bringing digital therapeutics—all as a certified service or medical device,” says Servaes, CEO and co-founder of moveUP. The ISO 13485 certified company’s expertise stemmed from orthopaedics, specifically knee/hip replacement, while it is extending its offerings constantly. For each pathology, moveUP matches with a clear value proposition for each of the stakeholders (patient empowerment, specialists, physical therapists, GP, nurse) through industry partnerships. By continuously applying extensive research and evidence collection, the expert team at moveUP is committed to improving its platform to enable personalised digital therapeutics in orthopaedics and beyond. In doing so, the company leverages lean methodology, focus groups, quality management system and clinical studies to strengthen its value proposition in the market. “Since our internationalisation, with the help of data-driven decision-making, we can flexibly customise our services to the needs and possibilities and apply it to multiple healthcare systems,” adds Servaes.

Our uniqueness lies in bringing digital therapeutics—all as a certified service or medical device

Typically, a patient’s journey starts with pre-surgery, and they continue with the program until they finish their rehabilitation. With moveUP’s personalised healthcare solution, a patient discharged from the hospital after surgery receives a day by day personalised treatment comprising meditation exercises, activities, and coaching, based on the accurate and highly granular data. Such an optimal treatment and active engagement while adhering to the compliance is enabled by applying a multi-modal medical device. While the patient’s entire journey is fully mapped in over 400 different data points, moveUP transforms the recovery process into a fully personalised and evidence-based voyage with the intelligent use of objective and subjective data, which is smartly collected. Although its services are standardised, moveUP keeps them optimal per patient by acknowledging and acting on continuous feedback.

Furthermore, in the wake of the global coronavirus pandemic, the demand for telehealth apps like moveUP has witnessed a sharp rise. To keep up with this demand, the company has launched a COVID-19 app and platform to support all the affected stakeholders. With this, moveUP offers a treatment to diagnose, triage and follow up for patients with COVID-19 symptoms. Alongside, an aggregated live dashboard allows constant monitoring of their status and progress. A patient with COVID symptoms can contact his GP and ask for hi COVID-moveUP code. With this code the doctor can immediately follow you up via the app. On the other hand, if a user cannot reach his GP for the COVID-moveUP code, a dedicated team of doctors can link him to his GP.

moveUP ensures that the treating surgeon is updated on the patient’s evolution through regular reports. The method of alerting the treating surgeon is old and cascading, with physical therapists and nurses in the first line of handling the majority of the care. They escalate an issue only in case of an emergency where the surgeon needs to be contacted. This frees the surgeon from having to perform daily checks on patients as they get constant alerts on the smartphone or website. The data-driven moveUP therapies system takes care of any issue until it becomes an emergency, allowing the surgeon to maintain his peace of mind. Additionally, as at each point, a clear report is available for every patient, the consultation is more optimised than the usual.

As moveUP looks to scale up, the company’s ISO certification has been instrumental in building and fortifying the clients’ trust. Besides ensuring efficiency with its product quality, moveUP also brings user satisfaction for the patient, surgeon, physical therapist, and every other stakeholder. Driven by Michael Porter’s value-based healthcare principles, moveUP reduces the number of dissatisfied patients and brings better results with lesser complications for the patients. Furthermore, backed by R&D partnerships with hospitals and universities, the company is currently developing data-driven machine learning models to enhance the efficiencies, outcome and patient satisfaction. When it comes to delivering world-class care to patients on a daily basis, the use of data can help surgeons, along with physical therapists and nurses to early-detect potential complications.

Moving ahead, moveUP is looking for flooding synergies with partners (industry/healthcare providers/funds) who can collaborate and invest in their innovation. With a scalable platform solution, the company has plans for an extension to domains and pathologies outside orthopaedics. “We will also extend the value that we bring in terms of patient insights, clinical decision-making, and high patient satisfaction, to other domains or types of treatments,” concludes Servaes.