Cleveland HeartLab research shows its tests have potential for healthcare cost savings

Cleveland HeartLab (CHL), a cardiovascular disease (CVD) management company, recently presented new research at the International Society of Pharmacoeconomics and Outcomes Research (ISPOR) Annual Meeting that demonstrates substantial cost savings for U.S. health plans through the addition of cardiovascular inflammatory testing to standard cholesterol testing. The study shows that averting mortality and morbidity from myocardial infarction (MI) and ischemic stroke (IS)—through the use of routine testing of multi-tiered cardiovascular risk markers of vascular inflammation—can save the U.S. healthcare system at least $180 million. This research was generated in collaboration with a team of expert economists from the Analysis Group, a leading health economics consultancy.

The CHL poster, “The Economic Impact of Implementing a Multiple Inflammatory Biomarker-Based Approach to Identify, Treat, and Reduce Cardiovascular Risk,” presented an economic model that quantifies the potential economic and clinical benefits of more accurately stratifying near-term cardiovascular risk through use of multiple inflammatory biomarker tests.

“We launched Cleveland HeartLab to make innovative inflammation testing a standard component of routine CVD risk assessment to help identify and prevent cardiovascular events in patients who were previously not known to have risk,” says Marc Penn, MD, PhD, FACC, Chief Medical Officer of CHL. “We’re very excited to report that the results of this collaboration demonstrate that along with improving outcomes, our approach can lead to a significant decrease in healthcare costs.”

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the total costs of cardiovascular diseases in the United States in 2010 exceeded $444 billion. Treatment of these diseases accounts for about $1 of every $6 spent on healthcare in this country. Learn more about Cleveland HeartLab.