Viz.ai Care Coordination Platform Evaluated in VALIDATE Study for Acute Stroke Care

February 8, 2023—Viz.ai and TeleSpecialists LLC announced that new data from the VALIDATE study were presented at ISC 2023, the International Stroke Conference, held February 8-10 in Dallas, Texas.

According to the companies, the VALIDATE study (Validation of Artificial intelligence [AI] to LImit Delays in Acute stroke Treatment and Endovascular therapy) demonstrated that hospital utilization of Viz.ai’s AI-powered care coordination platform was associated with a 39.5-minute reduction in patient arrival to time of first contact with the neurointerventionalist for need for potential emergency endovascular treatment.

Viz.ai is focused on AI-powered disease detection and care coordination. TeleSpecialists LLC, a physician-owned management service organization, provides emergent and nonemergent neurology and psychiatric patient care via telemedicine. In February 2022, Viz.ai and TeleSpecialists announced a strategic partnership aimed at bringing AI-powered care coordination together with leading telestroke neurologists to optimize time to treatment and improve patient outcomes across the United States.

As summarized in the press release, the independent VALIDATE study analyzed data extracted from acute stroke consultations seen by TeleSpecialists’ neurologists in the emergency department across 166 facilities in 17 states. A total of 14,116 patients were included from two groups: those seen in hospitals using AI (n = 8,557) and those seen in hospitals not using AI (n = 5,559).

The study found that the median door to neurointerventionalist notification time for AI was 50 minutes versus 89.5 minutes for non-AI (P < .001).

The statistically significant (P < .01) improvement in time to large clot recognition and contact with the neurointerventional team at Viz-enabled centers occurred regardless of whether the center did or did not have thrombectomy capability. The VALIDATE study abstract is available on the ISC website.

Thomas Devlin, MD, Professor of Neurology at the University of Tennessee Health Science Center in Chattanooga, Tennessee, is Senior Investigator of the study.

“The VALIDATE results demonstrate a time improvement in emergency stroke workflow between Viz-enabled and non-Viz-enabled centers that was statistically significant and highly clinically important,” commented Dr. Devlin in the companies' press release. “The study design allowed for very careful and rigorous insight into exactly how powerful the Viz.ai platform is at expediting treatment for one of the most time-sensitive conditions in all of medicine.”

Theresa Sevilis, DO, director of clinical research at TeleSpecialist and a study investigator, stated in the press release, “In the world of stroke treatment, the saying ‘time is brain’ comes from the fact that when brain tissue is deprived of oxygenated blood, approximately two million neurons die every minute. VALIDATE data show that use of the Viz platform resulted in a clinically important decrease in the time it took for large blood vessel occlusion recognition and contact with the interventional team, which in turn may translate to fewer neurons dying and, ultimately, better patient outcomes.”

Jayme Strauss, chief clinical officer at Viz.ai, added, “These data, which resulted from measuring the impact of our platform on patient care in the real world, reinforce results we’ve seen in previous studies that have typically involved a single center with a limited number of patients. The first multicenter study involving a large number of patients, VALIDATE compared results from the same time period between hospitals that used the Viz.ai platform and those that did not have AI software, thus eliminating the potential confounding effect of changes in workflow that occur in hospitals over time. This tightly controlled scientific study clearly illustrates the tremendous impact of our technology.”