Saint Peter’s University Hospital and Lightbeam Health Solutions on Tuesday announced a 7.1% absolute reduction (from 16.7% to 9.5%) in emergency department (ED) visits among high-risk patients using Lightbeam AI.
Lightbeam AI Social Determinants of Health (SDOH) Individual solution predicts which patients are at risk of avoidable ED utilization within the next 90 days based on social vulnerability and enables early interventions and streamlined care coordination without requiring complex integrations or costly clinical inputs.
Saint Peter’s, the 478-bed acute care, nonprofit teaching hospital in New Brunswick, said Lightbeam AI identified patients with food and transportation needs, empowering its clinical team to make efficient referrals to existing programs, ultimately enabling it to more effectively serve a growing and predominantly vulnerable population.
By detecting social vulnerabilities, which account for 80% of health outcomes, Lightbeam’s SDOH AI solutions prescribed targeted recommendations that empowered care teams to intervene proactively, significantly reduce avoidable ED utilization, and associated costs.
“Through partnerships and grant funding, we had existing programs to support food accessibility and transportation but not a way to efficiently identify which patients needed them,” Ishani Ved, director of Transformational Population Health and Outcomes at Saint Peter’s Healthcare System said.
Lightbeam’s SDOH Individual model offers a powerful, cost-effective solution to improve outcomes for high and rising-risk populations aligned with value-based care (VBC) performance objectives. By addressing social risk factors without requiring complex integrations, Lightbeam AI automates care intervention to prevent avoidable utilization, close care gaps, and deliver comprehensive, high-value care for those who are vulnerable and need it the most.
“This collaboration highlights the power of AI and the integration of SDOH to improve care, enhance care manager capacity, and achieve meaningful cost savings,” Pat Cline, Lightbeam CEO said. “Our market-leading, purpose-built AI models are transforming population health management for clients like Saint Peter’s to reduce ED visits and avoidable admissions while enhancing patient satisfaction.”
