1.8 Million-Procedure Outcomes Study Reveals All Stars

Boston, Massachusetts-based Avant-garde Health, a company focused on enhancing quality and profitability across the spectrum of care, announced that their analysis of 1.8 million procedures demonstrates that top researchers consistently achieve better patient outcomes compared to their peers.

In what was dubbed the “Healthcare Research All-Stars Initiative,” Avant-garde identified the top 5% of physician researchers across a wide range of surgical specialties.

The team first identified physicians by specialty, then assessed Medicare procedural volume and facility Medicare claims data. To be included in the Research All-Stars a hospital must have had at least one eligible surgeon during 2021-2022. The team then decided which surgeons to attribute to which hospitals, compiled peer-reviewed publications, calculated publication weights, and created a weighted publication score.

Avant-garde Health reviewed 2021-2022 Medicare Fee-for-Service data from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. All research appeared on PubMed and was weighted using Journal Impact Factor and author position.

The result? Patients treated by top surgeon-researchers showed a 5% lower rate of post-discharge complications and a 5% lower rate of mortality within 30 days after discharge.

“The findings clearly show that being a better researcher is associated with being a better clinician,” said Derek Haas, CEO of Avant-garde Health. “It is impressive that excellence in one domain does not come at the expense of the other.”

While other surgeons average 0.5 articles each year, these top surgeon-researchers had an average publication rate of 11 articles annually. The team also found that women are about 20% more likely to be in the top 5% of researchers in their clinical field when compared with their male counterparts, underscoring progress toward diversity and inclusion in healthcare research.

Research All-Star Lisa Cannada, M.D., an orthopedic trauma surgeon for Novant Health, spoke of this necessary progress, “Diversity in the field of orthopedics has been a cornerstone of my work, ensuring that we create an inclusive environment where the voices of women are heard and valued. Alongside this, my commitment to evidence-based medicine has [resulted in] over 200 [article] publications, highlighting the importance of rigorous research in advancing patient care.”