MANAGEMENT: Lori Orlando
DUKE INVENTOR: Geoff Ginsburg
MeTree is a family health history tool. Prior to an appointment, the doctor’s office will send an app-based survey for your/your family health history. Based on this data, the product will run algorithms, generate a report, and provide recommendations on lifestyle interventions with an overall goal of building a database of health, diseases, and outcomes.
Family history in primary care
The systematic collection of family health history (FHH) can identify individuals at increased risk for common diseases including cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and cancer; many evidence-based guidelines rely upon risk stratification using FHH to guide the appropriate use of alternative (non-routine) screening procedures (such as breast MRI), diagnostic tests, and/or genetic counseling.
Unfortunately there are several barriers to the adequate collection of FHH within routine primary care: lack of patient preparation to provide FHH, the amount of time needed to collect FHH, lack of standardization, and limited training in synthesizing FHH data into a clinically actionable care plan.
MeTree
To address these issues, we have created a web-based patient-entered risk stratification and clinical decision support tool, MeTree, with the following design goals:
- Develop a collection interface that is easy for patients to use and facilitates collection of all the necessary FHH and personal history components to perform risk stratification (full 3-generation pedigree with age of disease onset, current age or age of death, and cause of death for each relative)
- Provide lay level and technical decision support that is clinically actionable for providers, activating for patients, and easy for patients and providers to understand • Base decision support upon guidelines widely accepted by PCPs and provide just-in-time education within the reports about what criteria triggered the recommendation, points to consider about the recommendation, data such as NNT, references to the guidelines, and links to additional resources
- Capitalize on the patient-provider encounter to encourage discussions of preventive health and disease risk management.
MeTree will be available as an independent web-service that provides risk stratification and clinical decision support for the following conditions: breast cancer, ovarian cancer, colon cancer, hereditary cancer syndromes, coronary artery disease, hereditary cardiovascular conditions, stroke, aortic aneurysm, diabetes, and hereditary liver diseases (such as hemochromatosis).
