Phreesia, which offers wireless tablets for patient check-in at physician's offices, just announced a new risk assessment tool that aims to help doctors identify patients at risk for osteoporosis. The company worked with osteoporosis expert, Felicia Cosman, MD, and based its new assessment survey on the National Osteoporosis Foundation's (NOF) recently released Clinician's Guide to Prevention and Treatment of Osteoporosis.
The disease, which affects some 44 million in the U.S., is characterized by increased susceptibility to bone fracture because of low bone mass. The NOF estimates that osteoporosis-related injuries cost the U.S. healthcare system more than $17 billion each year.
"Osteoporosis-related fractures result in approximately 2.5 million medical office visits annually in the United States, and Phreesia is committed to reducing the enormous medical and personal burden of this disease on aging individuals and their families," said Chaim Indig, Phreesia's President and Chief Executive Officer in a company press release. "Bone health is essential to overall health and an important component of Phreesia's measurement guided care program, and we are very pleased to be leveraging the expertise of Dr. Cosman and the National Osteoporosis Foundation to help improve health outcomes in our network," said Indig.
Phreesia has up until now provided doctors' offices with free, wireless-enabled tablets that replace the old-fashioned, pen-and-paper clipboards used for patient check-in. The company offers the tablets for free because after the patient has checked-in, the tablet asks permission to share some health information, which may or may not be sponsored by a pharma company.
