EPOCA (Post-COVID Assessment Questionnaire) was developed by a working group of Swiss Insurance Medicine (SIM) and is used for the comprehensive evaluation, assessment and evaluation of Long COVID for medical and insurance purposes. More information on EPOCA can be found in this previous blog.
In close cooperation with the EPOCA working group of SIM and Altea, the knowledge tech company movos AG has now developed an app version of EPOCA, the Altea Care App. The EPOCA working group provided the medical content, while movos took over the implementation and provided the technical infrastructure.
Altea's role is to network all parties involved and support the pilot phase by recruiting doctors to test the app-based EPOCA assessment with their patients.
The Altea Care app makes it easier for patients and doctors to diagnose long COVID.
Most of the EPOCA questions ask patients to self-assess their state of health, while some questions must be assessed externally, i.e. by a doctor or practice assistant.
The user-friendly app version of EPOCA allows patients to complete the main part of the Long Covid Assessment on their smartphone from the comfort of their own home in preparation for an upcoming consultation. Questions that need to be assessed externally can be completed directly during the consultation with the doctor. Doctors can validate the answers online, interpret the results and export a summarized report.
The Altea Care app gives patients the option of scheduling the completion of the EPOCA questionnaire according to their energy resources. Both the patient and the doctor are spared long, stressful consultations. In addition, the evaluation of the digital assessment is significantly less time-consuming than a paper-based questionnaire.
In order to find out whether and how resources can be saved and whether the app-based EPOCA questionnaire is able to improve the diagnosis and thus also the care of patients, the app will be tested in a pilot phase over the next few months.
During this pilot phase, the app will be available to selected doctors and their patients. The participants in this test phase will use the app and its practicability, user-friendliness and any efficiency gains compared to the paper version of the EPOCA assessment will be evaluated afterwards.
We at Altea are excited about the results and look forward to being able to improve the care of Long COVID sufferers in the future with the help of the Altea Care App!
