Special mention for the Teramo Local Health Authority at the Politecnico di Milano School of Management’s Digital Innovation in Healthcare Awards, organised by the Osservatorio Sanità Digitale (www.osservatori.net) and which aims to create opportunities for awareness and sharing the best digital healthcare projects in Italy. The Teramo Local Health Authority’s project in collaboration with the Poste Italiane Group to increase the population’s adherence to screenings for the early diagnosis of colorectal cancer received the recognition.
The home kit
In October 2021, citizens in the province of Teramo started being sent a kit containing an invitation letter that also includes a QR Code linking to a customised video, an information leaflet, instructions for participating or sending the sample, a test tube with an RFID tag to verify the test tube’s receipt by the laboratory and associate it with the specific kit sent to the person so as to ensure continuous monitoring of the screening progress, plus return envelopes with RFID tags that match the test tube.
The simplest solution
A recall service has also been activated by the Teramo Local Health Authority help desk which not only provides assistance to citizens but also verifies that the kit has been delivered. With the new solution, citizens are only asked to provide the sample and take the kit to the nearest pharmacy. It is a simpler and less laborious solution than the previous one, in which citizens had to, for example, go to the pharmacy to pick up the test tube.
The benefits of the project
The project has had positive effects. Adherence to the screening programme now stands at 52.2% (figure for February 2023), which is higher than the national average and much higher than the 2019 figure for the Teramo Local Health Authority, which stood at around 26% (in the following years, the figure was influenced by the pandemic). Another result was the limitation of the number of unsuccessful invitations to 5%, made possible through recalling activities with prompt correction of invitations.
