Quicker Comprehensive Neuropsych Testing: Creyos and Yukon Neurology
Published: 30/01/2024
Written by: Creyos
Summary
Yukon Neurology cares deeply about delivering exceptional patient care, so they rely on cognitive assessments that are approachable, easy to interpret, and that empower patients with lots of health data. They achieve 99 percent completion rates on their assessments for mild cognitive impairment and dementia.
That’s why they use Creyos.
The Challenges
- Lack of data transparency or unclear results from hospitals and other neurology practices.
- Patient anxiety and resistance to exploring signs of cognitive decline means lower testing completion rates and treatment follow through.
- Limited tools available for evaluating mild cognitive impairment, identifying the specific areas of decline, and measuring treatment efficacy for patients.
The Solutions
- Access to a comprehensive battery of assessments for mild cognitive impairment and comorbid factors such as sleep, anxiety, depression, stress, attention deficit, and more.
- Lead with patient experience by administering gamified cognitive tasks on tablet, creating a comfortable environment, and providing technician support.
- Seamless integration into administrative workflows and reimbursement processes.
The Results
- Yukon Neurology is able to see an average of 30 patients daily and complete 10 neuropsychological exams weekly.
- Time to administer neuropsychological testing went from 6 hours down to 2 hours.
- 99 percent of patients complete cognitive assessments vs. 94 percent prior to Creyos.
- Yukon Neurology gained additional patient referrals for ADHD testing, depression, anxiety, and more.
Introducing Yukon Neurology: Excelling in Patient Experience
Founded in 2018 by Dr. David McCoy, Yukon Neurology is an independent medical practice that sets itself apart by creating excellent patient-physician relationships.
Yukon Neurology evaluates and treats a wide variety of neurological conditions, including seizures, epilepsy, stroke, migraine, headache, nerve disorders, neuromuscular disorders, multiple sclerosis, and much more. A large portion of their patient base includes mild cognitive impairment (MCI) and dementia.
The Challenge: Anxiety, Resistance, and Limited Insights
Patient experience is everything at Yukon Neurology. A bad healthcare experience can break trust and prevent a patient from following through on diagnosis and treatment. A great experience can lead to better patient engagement and health outcomes.
Dr. McCoy founded Yukon Neurology after facing blockers within the hospital system—a notable one being that proprietary EEG data cannot be shared among physicians or directly with patients. And even in neurology practices, cognitive assessment generally takes six hours and the resulting reports can still be difficult to interpret. Dr. McCoy started to look for a cognitive assessment solution that would allow him to transparently and easily report cognitive health insights to patients, hoping to empower them with as much health information as possible.
Mindful of patient experience, Dr. McCoy also wanted to find a solution that would ease patient anxiety about seeking care for early signs of cognitive decline. Many patients are resistant to exploring memory concerns altogether—because of the nature of these concerns and because testing can be time-intensive and complex. Technology can also be an intimidating factor and an accessibility barrier for older patients. Performing a cognitive assessment on a computer can create stress that affects mindset and results.
With all of these factors in mind, Dr. McCoy looked for a cognitive assessment solution that was approachable and engaging, and could be administered in a shorter session. To resolve issues around anxiety, resistance, and transparency, Creyos was the perfect fit.
Unfortunately, a lot of people think that even beginning to investigate memory issues means they’re definitely going to find a severe problem and go straight to a memory facility. Really, it’s not like that. By testing early, we can perhaps reverse issues or at least prevent things from getting worse.
— Melissa Picchione, Medical Director, Yukon Neurology
The Solution: A Robust, Gamified Cognitive Testing Experience
With Creyos, Yukon Neurology adopted a robust battery of assessments that allow them to measure early signs of mild cognitive impairment and communicate in detail to patients. Beyond their typical neuropsychological services, they can also evaluate comorbid factors such as sleep, anxiety, depression, stress, attention deficit, and more. The ability to address comorbid factors has made for a more complete diagnostic process that leads to better patient outcomes.
We've seen that patients are more invested in their health and they pay more attention to the deficits that showed up in testing. During follow up appointments, they let us know if they feel things have gotten better or worse. Then we can re-test them using actual quantitative measures and show them the side-by-side comparison to their earlier results.
— Melissa Picchione, Medical Director, Yukon Neurology
Yukon Neurology leans into their value of putting patient experience first by administering Creyos on tablets, creating a comfortable environment, and providing the support of a technician. The gamified user experience of Creyos tasks ease anxiety, while still capturing detailed information on the patient’s cognitive performance. Patients generally say they’re fun to complete.
We administer Creyos on tablets and relate the tasks to being like puzzle games that our patients have likely played before. Because the tasks are gamified, Creyos alleviates some of the technology anxiety that our older patients have.
— Melissa Picchione, Medical Director, Yukon Neurology
Seamless Reimbursement Workflows
Seamless integration into their clinical workflows and reimbursement practices were essential for Yukon Neurology—and Creyos hit the mark. EMR integration creates efficiencies for office staff by automatically uploading the comprehensive reports and session notes to patient records.
When it comes to processing claims for reimbursement, Yukon Neurology finds that Creyos is compliant with many of the requirements for neuropsychological testing, and has made it easy to facilitate interpretation of results by the doctor, administration of tests by a technician, and automation of detailed documentation.
The Result: Next-Level Neurology Experience
Yukon Neurology is setting themselves a step above the typical neurology experience. Since using Creyos, they've seen measurable improvements in:
- Saved time
- Increased test completion rates
- Growth of the practice
Saved Time
Yukon Neurology has accepted patients who have completed neuropsychological testing elsewhere and indicated that their testing experience didn't address their concerns or provide clear next steps. In contrast, Yukon Neurology has reduced the time it takes to administer and interpret neuropsychological testing using Creyos—cutting the typical 6-hour visit down to 2 hours.
Increased Test Completion Rates
Yukon Neurology sees roughly 30 patients daily and completes 10 neuropsychological evaluations weekly. They improved completion rate since using Creyos. Now, 99 percent of patients complete cognitive testing, compared to their previous rate of 94 percent.
Growth of the Practice
Yukon Neurology is even growing their practice now that they use Creyos. Other neurology and psychiatry practices have sent them referrals—either when they don’t offer neuropsychological testing themselves, their results are difficult to interpret, or patients present with comorbid conditions that they know Yukon Neurology can now test for. Expanding on their services, Yukon Neurology has supported patients with concerns about ADHD, anxiety, and depression by administering tests in Creyos such as:
- ADHD Protocol
- GAD-7 for anxiety
- PHQ-9 for depression
With Creyos, we’re able to identify and measure that there is, in fact, an issue, such as memory. But now we can identify if it’s caused by an anxiety disorder, attention deficit disorder, or if it’s depression related. Creyos allows Dr. McCoy to actually get to the root of the problem—not just what the problem is, but what’s causing it, and whether we can address that cause.