CHICAGO – The Blue Cross Blue Shield Association (BCBSA) and Blue Health Intelligence® (BHI®) announced today that Thrive Earlier Detection (Thrive) has won the BlueCross BlueShield Data Innovation Challenge. Out of more than 130 submissions and five finalists, Thrive was chosen for its proposal to evaluate the health-economic impact of earlier multi-cancer detection, and better identify and predict populations that will most likely benefit from this approach. Thrive will have six months to continue to analyze a select dataset from BHI’s database of more than 5 billion covered procedures performed annually, originating from more than 170 million Blue Cross and Blue Shield (BCBS) members.
As a company, Thrive’s mission is to save lives by making earlier detection of cancer a part of routine medical care, which has led to the development of CancerSEEK, a liquid biopsy test that’s designed to detect many cancers at an earlier stage. Thrive plans to leverage BHI’s dataset to gain further insights into the health and overall cost implications of earlier cancer detection.
"It is a tremendous honor to win this challenge, which represents a significant opportunity to confirm that earlier detection of cancer can reduce costs and more importantly, increase survival,” said David J. Daly, chief executive officer of Thrive Earlier Detection. The cancer care gap is enormous -- with more than 1.7 million new cancer cases and 600,000 deaths due to cancer in 2019 alone, our team is passionate in our mission to reverse these tragically high numbers of cancer deaths. We look forward to this partnership, and the ways that it will help us realize our goal of saving lives by making earlier detection of cancer a part of routine medical care."
In April of 2019, BCBSA and BHI invited visionary companies to enter the BlueCross BlueShield Data Innovation Challenge to develop solutions that increase access to care, enhance patient engagement and improve care delivery and outcomes. Five finalists were chosen in September and given two months to test their hypotheses using a limited HIPAA-compliant-dataset. In November, the five finalists presented their findings to the Challenge’s Selection Committee, who then selected Thrive as the winner. The five finalists were: Livongo, Pager, Wildflower Health, Workit Health and Thrive.
“The overwhelming response and level of engagement from each of the visionary companies that participated in the BlueCross BlueShield Data Innovation Challenge was truly impressive and we congratulate Thrive for its winning approach,” said Bob Kolodgy, executive vice president and chief financial officer for BCBSA and BHI board member. "We know how critically important data is to improving our health care system and believe their work will drive meaningful change in detecting cancer and lowering costs.”
“We’re excited to continue working with Thrive as they dive even further into BHI’s immense store of longitudinal and historical healthcare data,” said Swati Abbott, CEO of BHI. “By providing a complete view into a population’s healthcare journey, our partnership offers the chance to bring greater innovation to cancer care for all Americans.”
BCBSA and BHI collaborated with HIMSS and Healthbox, a HIMSS Innovation Company, to implement the BlueCross BlueShield Data Innovation Challenge.
To learn more, visit https://bcbs.com/bluecross-blueshield-data-innovation-challenge.
About Blue Health Intelligence®
Leveraging the power of medical and pharmacy claims data from more than 190 million Americans, Blue Health Intelligence (BHI) delivers insights that empower healthcare organizations to improve patient care, reduce costs, and optimize performance. Our team of data analysts, clinicians, IT experts, and epidemiologists provide analytics, software-as-a-service, and in-depth consulting to healthcare stakeholders.
About HIMSS
HIMSS is a global advisor and thought leader supporting the transformation of health through information and technology. As a mission driven non-profit, HIMSS offers a unique depth and breadth of expertise in health innovation, public policy, workforce development, research and analytics to advise global leaders, stakeholders and influencers on best practices in health information and technology. HIMSS encompasses more than 77,000 individual members and 630 corporate members. Healthbox, a HIMSS Innovation Company, is a healthcare advisory firm that leading organizations trust with innovation and digital strategy development and execution.
About Thrive Earlier Detection
Thrive Earlier Detection Corp. is a healthcare company focused on incorporating earlier cancer detection into routine medical care to extend and save lives. Thrive is developing CancerSEEK, a liquid biopsy test that is designed to detect many cancers at earlier stages of disease that will serve as the core of its integrated cancer information offering. CancerSEEK is designed to be administered to healthy adults during routine medical care, such as a yearly checkup, alongside existing cancer screening tools.