Call9: Modernizing Emergency Care

By Samantha Denefrio, PhD

What is it?

After moving into a nursing home for three months, Call9’s Founder Dr. Timothy Peck noticed that many 911 calls and trips to the ER could be potentially avoided. Call9 trains and employs first-responders and places them in the locations that need them the most such as nursing homes and rehabilitation centers as the first line of defense in an emergency. They are called Clinical Care Specialists and they are trained to assess the immediate needs of patients face to face.

When a patient suffers an acute change of condition, the nursing home nurse activates Call9 and the Clinical Care Specialist goes to the patient’s bedside, taps the Call9 App and is immediately connected to a Call9 physician via Call9’s telemedicine platform (which also includes data analytics and integrations with the facility’s electronic medical records; watch video here).

Why is it innovative?

Call9 was developed to modernize the way health emergencies are handled in nursing homes and rehab centers. These facilities have long relied on 911 calls to handle escalating health issues of patients. This means unnecessary trips to the emergency room with long waits and a poor overall experience for the patient. Instead, Call9 trains first-responders and they are placed at nursing homes and rehab centers. When a patient requires attention for an acute illness, the Clinical Care Specialist connects with a Call9 doctor via the company’s technology platform to assess the patient and facilitate care.

Call9 Academy is the in-house training program for Clinical Care Specialists that includes lectures, workshops, virtual whiteboard sessions, and a 36-hour paid externship. Interested candidates can apply on Call9’s website.

The Market

Older Americans make up a growing and vulnerable population and the demand for high quality and efficient healthcare is greater than ever. Up to 19% of ambulance transports are coming from nursing homes and similar care facilities. With Call9’s system of remote access to emergency doctors, trips to the hospital can be reduced by 50% (Call9).

In just a few minutes from the time a new symptom or concern appears, the patient will be evaluated by an emergency doctor. This approach saves unnecessary hospital trips and is very cost-effective for insurance companies saving them as much as $8 M per year for a 200-bed nursing facility. In the event that a trip to the hospital is necessary, Call9 has partnered with the ride service Lyft to help family members get to their loved ones quickly (Med City News).

Mission

CEO and Founder Dr. Timothy Peck lived in the conference room of a nursing home in Long Island NY for three months to better understand the needs of the patients and the staff. Based on this experience, he said “Patient’s who could have and should have been treated in their nursing home bed were transferred to the ED worsening their condition and exacerbating the trauma of their acute event; and patients who would have immensely benefited from immediate intervention suffered unnecessarily while waiting to see a doctor in the emergency room. Call9’s high-touch, high-tech model, which connects our on-site first responders with remote Call9 Emergency Physicians via our technology platform, was the solution to both of those problems — realized in the service of our nation’s most vulnerable patients” (d.health summit).

Advantages