Welcome to Unscripted the AMCP Podcast, a look inside managed care pharmacy. Listen in as experts explore the challenges, innovations, and opportunities shaping healthcare for millions of patients. This episode of Unscripted, the AMCP podcast is sponsored by Vibrant Gastro, Inc. Delivering predictable relief from chronic idiopathic constipation, CIC, without the side effects and higher cost of prescription medications. This is the third of three episodes.
Welcome our guest speakers today, Dr. Christine Frissora, gastroenterologist and associate Professor of Clinical Medicine at the New York Presbyterian, Cornell University Medical Center, and Dr. Ken Schaecher, chief Medical Officer Emeritus, university of Utah Health Plans. And he currently serves an associate medical director at a regional health plan, as well as a practicing general internal medicine specialist.
They're joining us today to discuss a cost-effective breakthrough, transforming chronic idiopathic constipation, CIC, with a drug-free treatment solution. Welcome doctors. Thank you. Nice to see you again. Let's begin with you, Dr. Frissora, in this third episode. Can you discuss the study you co-authored on costs and its impact to payers as well as the member and employers?
Yes. Well, we are talking about the data about the vibrant system, and I published a paper last year in advances in therapy with Jeff Voigt, who is a nationally known healthcare economics expert, and we did health claims data for a year.
Reviewed the literature and found a cost-based analysis that showed that when you compare the vibrant system to linaclotide, that we have less cost because there's less visits to the emergency room, there's less visits to the doctor's office, and there's a higher compliance of care. And in the cost effective model, we showed that the Vibrant system was a more cost effective treatment than linaclotide.
Can you share a little bit about where the data came from and what the study was like, how you built that study? Uh, we reviewed, uh, medical literature from 2024 and one year claims data to show that the utilization for healthcare for people on linaclotide was higher than people on the vibrant system. And some of those emergency room visits were due to abdominal pain or diarrhea. Excellent. And we talked previously a little bit about indirect costs. So what were some of those?
We reviewed the medical literature from 2024 to look at the indirect costs. Indirect costs of things like absenteeism, which means being absent from work or being on sick leave. Uh, presenteeism, meaning that are you at work functioning or are you not functioning at work because you're not focused? And then quality of life scores. So how was the study done and what were the overall savings that you were able to demonstrate?
Uh, we used two Markov models with the health economies to show that it's the vibrant versus linaclotide. We had a one year savings, a $345, and at year three, $3,800 saving per person. So that was a significant amount of money that was saved. Excellent. Thank you so much for sharing that, Dr. Frissora, and for sharing your publication. So let's get back to you, Dr. Schaecher, can you summarize the key takeaways for payers?
Well, my, the takeaways I hope payers can take from our conversations are that constipation is one of those hidden conditions that maybe they need to take time to look at. It's not sexy, it's not GLP-1's that everybody in the world want to get on anymore. It's not oncology, it's not rare diseases, but when you've got 12% of the population affected by the disease, you're going to have significant costs. That's a greater prevalence than diabetes in the population.
So maybe for health plans, their takeaway should be, wow, maybe I have an opportunity here. I can't manage oncology. I can't manage rare diseases with their big price tags, but I can manage constipation and I can make inroads to therapy and therapeutic choices that can save my plan money at a time when the cost of healthcare continue to escalate. And we're all looking for solutions that can perhaps improve our bottom line. Um, so.
That's really the takeaway for payers is maybe it's time to stop, take a look at constipation and find a good solution that may help your bottom line, and also at the same time, help patients. This episode of Unscripted, the AMCP podcast is sponsored by Vibrant Gastro, the vibrating capsule for CIC. Do you have any last thoughts, Dr. Frissora? Well, we were discussing today the vibrant system. Which is a drug-free treatment for constipation.
The capsule is placed into the activator and then it's swallowed, and when they swallow it, it starts jiggling intermittently down to the large intestine. That vibration stimulates peristalsis and aalg wave goes all the way down to the large intestine, and the patient has a bowel movement.
In the research trials, it was called a complete spontaneous bowel movement, meaning that they have a bowel movement, it's complete, and they don't have what we call incomplete evacuation, meaning that they feel empty and normal, which is a good outcome. In addition, in the App Store, the patient can download the Vibrant app and it connects to their device, and they will have feedback about when they take their capsule and when they go to the bathroom.
For patients who have been lost in this misery for so long, it's very reassuring to them that they kind of have a little computer following them around tracking their B bowel movements. It's very reassuring to them. In addition, we published in Advances in Therapy, our study showing that there is cost-effectiveness with the Vibrant system compared to Linaclotide. We have less side effects with the Vibrant system and it's a new treatment. That meets an unmet clinical need.
So here we have a medical treatment that is drug free, no drug interactions. It's ideal for patients who don't wanna take medicine. It's ideal for patients who want something simple, and it's only taken five times a week. So the vibrant system is a great option for patients suffering from constipation.
And as a gastroenterologist, I do see hundreds of patients two thirds of whom are women suffering from constipation, and the constipation impedes their ability to work and to function normally in life. So when they see the vibrant system and I show it to them in my office, they're very excited that we have something new, effective, and safe to try. So this is why the Gastroenterology community is excited about the Vibrant System as a new treatment for constipation.
Thanks so much, Dr. Frissora and Dr. Schaecher. How about you? Any final thoughts? I think it's been outlined in our three podcasts that we've got a new and unique solution, the vibrant capsule that can, um, help offer a way to treat a condition that is not well managed at this time. Fewer side effects, better efficacy and cost savings. If you're a health plan, looking to try to find, um.
Small ways to make inroads into how to best manage your patients, provide the best coverage, but also at the same time control your spend. This is, this is the solution that will help with that. As a payer or a payer representative, I would just simply say to the payers, this is an opportunity for you to lower your costs and, uh, improve the health outcomes for your members.
By adding this to your formulary for coverage, you know, cover it as a medical benefit, cover it as a pharmaceutical benefit, whatever makes sense for you, but cover it because it, it will help you control your bottom line and at the same time, improve the health care of, um, the members that you serve. Thank you, Dr. Frissora and Dr. Schaecher for your participation in this series on chronic idiopathic constipation on Unscripted the AMCP podcast. This episode was sponsored by Vibrant Gastro.
Learn more about the drug-free solution@vibrantgastro.com.