Expanding Teleoncology at Rural Health Centers

Starting with these insights, we helped the agency build and implement frameworks for reaching out to and signing up new participants, and connecting, communicating, and collaborating with stakeholders at participating health centers on a more consistent basis. In some cases, our research helped expedite the sign-up, set-up, and certification of the program at newly participating facilities, shrinking the process from months to weeks.

To help patients better understand the program and how it can ease and improve their cancer care journey, we developed a short, friendly, easily digestible guide to set expectations, answer common questions, and address common concerns. The guide is now routinely shared with potential program patients.

As a result of our collaboration, the program is now growing rapidly. Outreach efforts have transitioned to intake efforts, as new facilities have gone from needing to be courted, to jumping in line to participate.

Based on the success of this work, Booz Allen is now applying the same human-centered design-informed approaches to growing participation in the agency’s oncology clinical trials program, which connects cancer patients with promising new experimental treatments.