At-home cancer care enabler Reimagine Care has launched a pilot collaboration with MedStar Health, a Washington, D.C.-based health system.

Through the collaboration, MedStar Health will incorporate Reimagine Care’s on-demand oncology care platform into its existing cancer care delivery model.

The pilot allows Reimagine Care to expand to the Maryland market.

“We are always looking to expand our geographical reach,” Dan Nardi, CEO of Reimagine Care, told Home Health Care News. “This is our first opportunity to support patients in the greater Maryland area. As we’ve been having conversations with prospects in that area, MedStar Health was one of the ones that was very progressive.”

MedStar Health is an integrated not-for-profit health system that offers a wide range of services in the greater Baltimore and Washington, D.C., areas.

On its end, Reimagine Care is an at-home, on-demand cancer care provider. The Nashville-based company provides technology-enabled services, which include data insights and a multidisciplinary care team, to health systems and oncologists to help them deliver at-home, value-based cancer care.

Over the years, Reimagine Care has developed partnerships with the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus, DispatchHealth and Memorial Hermann Health System, among others.

While MedStar Health already operates an extensive cancer care program, focusing on innovative treatments, this partnership allows the health system to extend its reach into the home.

Nardi explained that Reimagine Care has been able to bridge the gap between the demand and supply challenges that health organizations delivering cancer care face.

“There’s this demand for cancer care,” he said. “On the supply side, we already have a shortage of oncologists and burnout happening, RNs leaving the workforce, so you have this growing divide in supply and demand. We’re able to support patients for the 98% of the cancer journey that happens outside of the clinic, which becomes really beneficial for those oncology clinics like MedStar, so they can really focus on [operating at the top of their] license, and supporting the patients that are with them in the clinic.”

A key component of the Reimagine Care and MedStar Health collaboration is AI-powered patient engagement and symptom management, RPM technology, and other supports.

“The core of our technology-enabled services, our on-demand cancer care platform, is really centered around Remi,” Nardi said. “Remi is our AI-based virtual assistant that does a lot of the heavy lifting. That’s our digital front door, if you will, our initial point of contact with patients. Being able to connect with patients within seconds, no matter where they are, no matter what time of day, and helping to give them initial answers, helping them through any symptoms they might be experiencing from their cancer treatment, is really what allows us to do this at scale.”

Remi allows Reimagine Care to magnify its existing care team, as well as the teams of its partner companies, Nardi said.

Supporting cancer patients in the home setting enables providers to address a whole host of issues, according to Nardi.

“Being able to support patients in the home, either virtually or by actually going into the home, saves so much time,” he said. “For some patients, it’s not safe to be traveling in. They may have compromised immune systems, as they’re going through treatments. Being able to support them in the home reduces that risk as well.”

Ultimately, at-home cancer care is well-positioned to become a critical part of the broader treatment journey, according to Nardi.

“Our goal is not to replace the oncologist and the care they provide in the clinic,” he said. “That is an extremely important part of this journey for patients. We’re there to help support patients when they’re not in the clinic, when they can’t get into the clinic, when they have lower severity symptoms. If we can support patients in that type of setting, in those situations, it frees up the oncologist and the team in the clinic to focus on the higher severity patients.”