Patient-reported outcomes (PRO) play a crucial role in helping government regulators and healthcare providers measure the real-world impact of new therapies. DerShung Yang, Ph.D., founded BrightOutcome in 2002 to develop ways to integrate PROs into electronic medical records.

Research conducted via the company’s early NIH Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) awards from the National Cancer Institute laid the groundwork for the development of BrightOutcome’s three key products. The first of these products, ePROmeasure™, an advanced web-based electronic PRO solution designed for health providers, researchers, clinical trial managers, and life sciences professionals, provides turnkey ePRO study design, administration, data capture, scoring, and reporting for accurate, affordable, and secure ePRO research insights.

BrightOutcome’s second key product is MyCaringCircle™. It gives patients a secure location to store their cancer-care information, keep track of their cancer-related events, keep a private journal, and report cancer-related symptoms that alerts their provider to moderate-to-severe symptoms. 

SymptomCareAnywhere™ (SCA), the company’s third key product, is designed to reduce the burden of self-management for cancer patients in outpatient care settings or at home. The SCA system allows patients to self-report more than a dozen cancer-related symptoms and if indicators are reported as moderate to severe, a designated care team member is alerted automatically via email or paged alert.

The company continues to build on the success of its core products in two principal ways. First, it is recognized for its success as an NIH SBIR grantee awardee, thereby attracting healthcare organizations as partners in the expansion of its platforms to other areas, such as behavioral health and primary care. Second, BrightOutcome seeks to integrate its products as components of existing electronic medical record platforms.

Dr. Yang, who is also BrightOutcome’s president, made valuable connections as a participant in the NIH Commercialization Assistance Program for SBIR awardees. One new contact resulted in BrightOutcome’s strategic partnership with Northwestern University, one of several universities comprising the PROMIS® (Patient Reported Outcomes Measurement Information System) network. "By working with Northwestern, we were able to incorporate PROMIS® questionnaires into all BrightOutcome products," noted Yang. Additionally, BrightOutcome has partnered with Allscripts, one of the major players in the electronic medical records industry, and has others — Epic Systems Corporation and Cerner Corporation — in its sights.

Niina Haas, BrightOutcome vice president has much praise. “I could not imagine being able to do the breadth of work that we do with the number of people and connections involved without the support of the NIH SBIR program.”