Trellus Health launches direct-to-consumer offering in New York area

Connected health platform operator Trellus Health announced the launch of its direct-to-consumer offering in the New York tri-state area on Monday, for people living with Crohn's disease and ulcerative colitis.

The AIM-traded firm said the service would provide its “resilience-based methodology” to support adult patients' clinical treatment plans through care coordination, behavioural skills training, expert disease education and remote patient monitoring.

It said the programme would include personalised whole-person care plans, the HIPAA-compliant ‘TrellusElevate’ digital platform, telehealth services, and remote access to an expert licenced care team, including a nurse educator, behavioural health counsellor, dietitian and resilience coach.

Initially, Trellus would offer enrolment for patients over the age of 17 in the states of New York, New Jersey and Connecticut, with plans to expand into more than 20 states by the end of the year.

The board said that, with more than 30 million residents, the tri-state area contained “one of the highest concentrations” of people living with IBD in the United States of around 250,000 patients.

Trellus said it was partnering with Connected Health Medicine to deliver telehealth clinical services using licensed healthcare professionals.

Fees to access and engage with the company's direct-to-consumer service would be paid directly by patients, or reimbursed by health insurance using existing current procedural terminology (CPT) codes with select commercial insurance plans.

It said direct-to-consumer pricing was lower on average than value-based business-to-business contract fees, and a discounted introductory monthly membership rate was being offered to build rapid awareness and recruitment.

As it previously said in its December update, Trellus' focus in 2022 would be on recruitment of direct-to-consumer patients, and the establishment of additional demonstration programmes and business-to-business contracts.

That, the board said, would enable Trellus to gather “real world evidence” to validate and reinforce the health quality and economic outcomes shown in the co-founders' published research, as well as informing further product development.

“IBD is a debilitating, incurable condition that requires behavioural support to cope with the complexity and challenges of daily living,” said chief executive officer Monique Fayad.

“Trellus Health partners with IBD patients and their GI Providers, offering behavioural, nutritional and clinical monitoring support and tools beyond traditional episodic medical care, with the goal of empowering patients, improving outcomes and reducing the need for unplanned hospital and emergency room visits.

“Healthcare providers can look to Trellus as a trusted extension of their gastroenterology practice that helps improve care plan adherence and outcomes through remote patient monitoring and access to much needed whole-person care.”

At 1310 GMT, shares in Trellus Health were up 3.36% at 30.49p.