The use of Organizer Software for secure team based clinician_to_clinician communication to improve recipient outcomes for solid_organ donation cases - Organ transplantation is a complex process requiring effective coordination and communication amongst a highly distributed network of providers within a short window of time in order for a successful transplantation to occur. However, Fewer than 40% of authorized donated organs are transplanted successfully and over 120,000 patients in the US are waiting for a transplant, with 22 patients dying every day (Organ Procurement and Transplantation Network (OPTN) 2014 data). Failures to transplant a larger percentage of authorized donated organs result, in part, from a medical professional's lack of access to secure, timely, and accurate information required in order to determine viability of donated organs and coordinate their successful recovery. These discarded organs amount to significant waste and could be used for a variety of impactful applications, dependent on viability. Discarded organs could be used by transplant centers, medical researchers, and pharmaceutical companies to increase life-saving transplants, translational research, drug discovery/testing, and cells for new and innovative therapies. To address the need for an improve communications system to help improve transplant patient outcomes and the number of viable, but unused organs that could be successfully transplanted, Organizer Inc. has developed, ORGANIZER, a mobile application for secure team communication to improve organ transplant outcomes for deceased organ donation cases. The proposed project is designed to test and quantify the improvement of the donor management, coordination process, and patient outcomes proving commercial feasibility using ORGANIZER for medical team communication. If successful, the approach can be extended and disseminated to all organ procurement organizations (OPOs) and Transplant networks. The results of this research will determine whether ORGANIZER can be adopted as the communication "best practice" for organ procurement and transplant organizations during donor management and coordination. Organizer Inc. will partner with Relational Coordination Analytics (RCA) Inc. to introduce and deploy a hybrid relational and process improvement methodology aimed at assessing the impact of Organizer Inc.'s mobile application on outcomes for donor management, coordination for organ procurement, and transplant patients. Develop and deploy beta software prototype. Prove feasibility of the Organizer Inc. communication system through robust validation testing. Successful completion of this SBIR Phase I study will result in a functional, validated communication software system that meets or exceeds preliminary performance and user satisfaction metrics resulting in improved transplant patient outcomes.
