Keeping Sickle Cell Patients out of the Hospital: CTSI Funds New Project

The Clinical and Translational Science Institute (CTSI) of Southeast Wisconsin has awarded a $25,000 “Innovations in Healthcare Delivery Pilot Model Grant” to develop a new management protocol for sickle cell disease patients, with the end goal being reduced hospital readmission rates.

Joshua Field, MD, MS, associate professor of medicine (hematology) and the medical director of the adult sickle cell clinic at Froedtert & the Medical College of Wisconsin, and a medical director of BloodCenter of Wisconsin, is the primary investigator of the grant.

In this project, Dr. Field will examine a multi-disciplinary, intensive management strategy to reduce the rate of hospital admission and 30-day readmission for adults with sickle cell disease with the highest rates of acute care at Froedtert Hospital. Those ten adults have a combined number of 227 emergency department and hospital admissions and a readmission rate of 62 percent.

A collaborative team comprised of a physician, pharmacist, social worker and psychologist will formulate a plan of care and then intensively manage the patients. Efforts will be focused on addressing the unmet medical, social and psychological needs of the patients. To evaluate the program’s effectiveness, admission rates in the six months leading up to the project will be compared with the final six months of the project. If successful, this model may be applicable to other patient populations.

Sickle cell disease is the most prevalent hereditary blood disorder in the United States with 90,000 - 100,000 people affected. In Wisconsin, there are approximately 800 individuals living with sickle cell disease.

The “Innovations in Healthcare Delivery” grants are supported by the Medical College Physicians, MCW’s physician group practice caring for adult patients, and the CTSI. The fundamental goal is to stimulate innovative pilot projects that promise to measurably and meaningfully improve delivery of healthcare in terms of clinical quality, patient experience, value and efficiency.

CTSI is part of a national consortium of top medical research institutions. Working together, the CTSI institutions are committed to improve human health by streamlining science, transforming training environments and improving the conduct, quality and dissemination of clinical and translational research. The CTSI program is led by the National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences, part of the National Institutes of Health.