Fuse Oncology, the clinical workflow platform for radiation oncology, announced it is extending FuseRx, its prescribing and treatment-intent solution, to the rest of the radiation oncology care team. FuseRx launched for physicians in July, covering the consult note and the treatment intent, built in one workflow. The expanded workflow incorporates BluePrint, a treatment-planning application developed in the University of Michigan Department of Radiation Oncology and licensed to Fuse through U-M Innovation Partnerships. The physicist, dosimetrist, therapist and nurse roles will be on display at the American Society for Radiation Oncology (ASTRO) Annual Meeting.
Most patients wait three to four weeks between a radiation oncology consult and their first treatment. Part of the delay is the duplication of effort between physicians, physicists, dosimetrists, therapists and nurses as they work from PDFs, faxes and free-text notes to create and verify intent, simulation, treatment plans and scheduling. FuseRx was built to streamline every step of the workflow, starting with the physician.
FuseRx gives physicians a single guided workflow for the complete treatment intent — simulation orders, prescriptions, target and organ-at-risk goals and supporting orders — with clinic-configurable templates, a validation engine with configurable safety checks and hard stops, and a full change-request audit trail. The intent is created and kept in FuseRx and delivered to the clinic's existing oncology information system, including both Mosaiq and ARIA. As each role is added, it enters the same workflow rather than a separate product.
FuseRx grew out of a working department. Cone Health Radiation Oncology — part of Risant Health, the nonprofit created by Kaiser Foundation Hospitals — has run the prototype FuseRx is built on for several years. In that time the department has seen 35 per cent more patients than the U.S. average with 34 per cent fewer FTEs and has brought the time from consult to treatment down to 3.4 days. The department also ranks in the 98th percentile nationally for safety culture (AHRQ SOPS) and the 98th percentile for leadership and 96th percentile for employee engagement (Press Ganey), with a 97.5 percent patient likelihood-to-recommend score.
