By Ben Adams
Icon ($ICLR) has signed a deal with the International Consortium for Health Outcomes Measurement (ICHOM) to work out the best and cheapest ways of getting value-based healthcare to patients.
ICHOM said in a statement it has chosen the Ireland-based CRO as its partner for the launch of its new global healthcare outcomes benchmarking program called Globe.
Icon will use its data analytics program Iconik to help run the data management side of a project that will provide healthcare systems with a platform to share and compare high-quality, risk-adjusted health outcomes.
This will include using broad data sets to assess where best practice is being made and how cost-effective healthcare interventions are, and whether savings could be made whilst still delivering the best care for patients.
ICHOM is an independent, not-for-profit organization founded in 2012 and is set up to measure and compare health outcomes around the world.
In its first phase, ICHOM worked with more than 400 doctors, registry leaders, and patients worldwide to develop what it calls standard sets aimed at providing a common language and approach to measuring outcomes at the condition level.
The standard sets address 13 conditions that cover around 35% of the global disease burden. To date, more than 70 healthcare provider systems and academic medical centers worldwide are using these standard sets to measure health outcomes, the group said.
As part of its next phase, the new Globe initiative is designed to allow providers to compare their patients' outcomes to those of their peers and then look at ways to improve outcomes and/or lower costs while maintaining outcomes.
Steve Cutler, chief operating officer at Icon, said: "We are proud to bring our clinical and technical expertise in health outcomes and real-world data to help ICHOM to create the first global healthcare outcomes benchmarking program. [This] announcement is a further example of our commitment to working with health and life science partners to develop new and innovative solutions that improve patient outcomes and reduce healthcare costs."
Icon has signed a spate of deals and tie-ups over the past 2 years, including partnerships with Genomics England and IBM Watson ($IBM), as well as the takeover of MediMedia Pharma Solutions and the buyout of PMG Research.
- read the release