WILMINGTON — A pair of grants will facilitate joint studies by area physicians to help advance prenatal scans and improve surgical care.
With a $1-million investment, Novant Health physicians based in Wilmington are partnering with peer physicians and researchers at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill to advance two clinical research efforts in North Carolina. The grants are $500,000 each for tools that will facilitate better care. One is testing artificial intelligence to help with pregnancy healthcare and the other is researching alternatives to opioids administered to help with pain post-surgical care.
Mark King, vice president of research and innovation at Novant Health and the chair of the collaborative’s Research Advisory Council, said the grant money is important for two issues affecting southeastern North Carolina.
“In addition, these collaborations will build additional infrastructure for future research here at the coast,” he wrote in a press release from Novant.
Ultrasounds have been the go-to in prenatal care nationwide for more than 50 years, but vary throughout a pregnancy. UNC researchers already have been engaging in ways to develop low-cost, accessible ultrasound technology in areas without access. They’ve found portable ultrasound devices with AI that can read imagery.
The study is expected to include a local sample size of 600 pregnant women over two years to focus on uncommon and rare obstetric conditions.
Researchers have paired portable ultrasound devices with artificial intelligence to interpret the images in real time. Locally, researchers will enroll an expected sample size of 600 pregnant women over two years, focusing on uncommon and rare obstetric conditions. While some patients have been enrolled already statewide, locally the physicians are looking to include women from rural and underserved regions.
The project, titled “Democratizing obstetric ultrasound on the North Carolina Coast: an innovation research platform,” is led by Dr. Ben Chi and Dr. Katelyn Rittenhouse from UNC and Dr. Lindsey Buckingham and Dr. Ashwin Patel from Novant Health.
Additionally, a collaborative is established to look into best ways to treat pain post-surgery and reduce opioid prescriptions.
Surgeons that participate will receive benchmarked performance reports and meet to review performance, identify improvement targets, and develop and test novel approaches to improve quality and reduce costs to support evidence-based improvement processes, according to the release.
“The collaborative’s first focus area is the use of opioids to treat pain after a patient undergoes a general surgery,” it indicated. “This project was selected, in part, because of the known risk a percentage of patients will become persistent users. Additionally, variation in prescription practices exists depending on the type of surgery.”
Goals include increasing access to safe and convenient opioid disposal; advancing patient education about pain expectations and alternatives; and sharing a data-driven standard opioid prescribing schedule based on surgical procedure and patient usage.
The project, titled “Building an Implementation Science Network to Reduce Post-Operative Opioid Prescribing in Coastal NC,” is led by Dr. Jared Gallaher, Dr. Clara Lee and Jessica Schumacher, Ph.D. from UNC and Dr. William Hope from Novant Health.
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