Driven by data

All our patients are monitored by the Electronic Persistent Outcome Collaboration (ePPOC) and our Managing Director is a member of the ePPOC Clinical Management Advisory Committee. We are able to provide reports every 6 months on a range of outcomes including medication, treatment utilisation, return to work, program costs and duration as well as a series of validated outcome measures including the Brief Pain Inventory, the Depression Anxiety Stress Scale, the Pain Catastrophising Scale and the Pain Self Efficacy Questionnaire. Over the past 5 years these data have had a major impact on review and improvement in our programs as demonstrated on the following graph showing improvement on opioid use after major program restructure. We own our outcomes.

This graph further demonstrates our commitment to clinical quality assurance and continuous improvement. In 2016-2018, the ePPOC results showed a significant decrease in the percentage of patients achieving a “clinically important” reduction in opioids at 6-months post program. As a result, we reviewed our clinical protocols and pain management approaches in a systematic evidence-based manner, resulting in a dramatic turnaround over the past 3 years. In 2021 over 70% of all patients taking opioids at the beginning of our pain management programs had reduced their intake by over 50% at 6 months post program.

Given the costs and harms of opioid overuse these results are an outstanding endorsement of the effectiveness of our pain management programs and our ability to respond to outcome data.

Currently we are undertaking a major randomised controlled trial to improve self efficacy in our patients. In the compensable environment this metric can be challenging to shift and we wish to improve from average (compared to most providers who see less complex private pain patients) to well above average.