We are pleased to share that PainChek wrapped up 2021 in a strong position, putting us in good stead for further growth in the year ahead.
Between September and December, we expanded the use of our digital pain assessment tool in aged care, both in Australia and internationally. Our team also continued to grow our footprint across the infant, home care, hospital, and disability markets and worked on establishing key partnerships across the globe.
Bringing accurate pain assessment to aged care residents across four continents
Looking back over the year, PainChek achieved exceptional growth despite the continued challenges presented by the pandemic. The past year saw PainChek expand its presence across the aged care sector in Australia, the UK, New Zealand and Singapore, with fantastic results:
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- 76% increase in contracted beds, from 71,318 to 125,167
- 71% increase in contracted Residential Aged Care facilities, from 884 to 1,509
Australia: PainChek® is currently licensed for use in more than 60% of Australian Residential Aged Care facilities and is present in every state and territory across the country. As of 31 December, more than 850,000 clinical assessments had been conducted using PainChek®, representing a 224% increase from the previous year and 31% over the prior quarter.
UK: Traction is growing across the UK, with PainChek® contracted for use across 3,500 beds and government funding received for pilots in Scotland and Wales. PainChek is now partnering with five care management system providers—Person Centred Software, Access Health, Nourish, Care Vision, and VCare—which cover 175,000 beds across the UK and represent strong further growth potential.
Orchard Care Homes, a UK-based care home committed to providing quality care to all residents, shared resoundingly positive feedback on implementing PainChek®:
“We have rolled out PainChek® across the Orchard portfolio, initially focusing on our dementia communities. However, once we observed such amazing results it was agreed to launch in all of our care homes… it is by far the best decision I have made, introducing this technology to our residents.”
– Cheryl Baird, Group Director of Quality, Orchard Care Homes
New Zealand: Summerset Care, the country’s third-largest rest home provider, successfully completed a pilot program with plans to roll out PainChek® across all of its 1,200 beds by mid-2022.
PainChek® also has regulatory clearance in Singapore and Canada, and our team is working hard to expand our footprint in these regions in 2022. We are progressing with FDA regulatory clearance in the USA, having lodged our pre-submission supplement in the December quarter. A response from the FDA is expected by the end of March.
Additionally, our clinical team has successfully delivered training remotely to over 8,000 aged care clinicians through the ongoing COVID-19 restrictions, with over 1,700 users trained over the December quarter.
PainChek® and MPS Connect partner to provide a complete pain management solution
We have recently established a landmark integration partnership with medication management provider MPS Connect, combining PainChek®’s pain assessment tool with the soon-to-be-launched MediSphere™ medication management system.
The integration will benefit home care consumers, aged care residents, and clinicians by:
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- providing detailed information of pain at the time of pain relief medication delivery
- minimising the subjectivity associated with an individual’s pain threshold and pain relief
- providing insights into the effectiveness of pain relief medication on an individual’s pain rating over time, and changes to PRN pain relief
- enabling consistent review of pain and medication management effectiveness in one tool
We look forward to sharing more on this collaboration in the coming months.
More broadly, PainChek now partners with 22 aged care management and medication management systems, in total covering more than 180,000 beds in Australia, 25,000 beds in New Zealand, and 175,000 beds in the UK.
Supporting the global COVID-19 infant vaccination program
The global COVID-19 vaccination program is expected to be rolled out for infants (aged one month to one year) in the second half of 2022.
PainChek has proposed to work with governments and the healthcare community to support post-vaccination pain management and resolution via PainChek® Infant, the world’s first automated procedural pain assessment tool for infants. This would serve to enhance tracking of vaccination safety for infants, enable parents to monitor post-vaccination pain in their children and potentially reduce subsequent doctor and hospital visits.
According to PainChek® CEO Phillip Daffas:
“Healthcare professionals and parents around the world now have access to a tool to assess infant’s post-procedural pain. The infant’s pain severity score is documented within the PainChek® Infant app to monitor and assess post-vaccination pain that infants may experience and provide peace-of-mind for parents who will be educated to manage any signs and symptoms.”
Ongoing progress in the hospital and disability sectors
Clinical studies are currently underway at Ramsay Hospital Research Foundation to evaluate the effectiveness of the PainChek® app in the hospital’s geriatric and rehabilitation ward.
Additionally, PainChek® has been taken on as a long-term pain assessment solution by the Nulsen Group in Western Australia, following a successful trial and study conducted during 2021. We now have our sights set on a broader launch into the NDIS community in 2022.
Continuing our mission in 2022
Looking forward, we remain focused on improving quality of care within the global Residential Aged Care sector, and bringing best-practice pain assessment and management to the infant, home care, hospital, and disability markets.
If you’d like to learn more about implementing PainChek in your organisation, submit your expression of interest here.
