The following article was originally published in the Corridor Business Journal’s Business Weekly on December 6th, 2019.

CarePortMD retail health clinics at Albertsons grocery stores have become the first retail health clinic to offer the first autonomous AI diagnostic system for diabetic retinopathy, IDx-DR.

The IDx-DR system from Coralville-based IDx will help distinguish Albertsons’ retail health offering from others in the rapidly growing field. Albertsons has added five CarePort MD clinics to stores in Delaware and Pennsylvania in the past year.

“Artificial intelligence diagnostics like IDx-DR align seamlessly with our mission to increase the access, affordability, and quality of healthcare,” said Ashok Subramanian, MD, the CEO of CarePortMD. “We are proud to offer this service to our patients as part of our comprehensive diabetes care program.”

IDx-DR uses AI to identify patients with diabetic retinopathy and macular edema, common complications of diabetes and a leading cause of blindness. Experts recommend annual eye exams to catch disease in its early stages, but as few as 15% of Medicare patients actually do, according to a diabetes care study.

“Our goal is to ensure all patients with diabetes have access to the diabetic retinopathy exam so that we can improve patient outcomes,” IDx founder and CEO Dr. Michael Abramoff said in a news release. “More patients are getting their healthcare in retail clinics, so there is value in exploring the space. We were attracted to CarePortMD’s care coordination model; it’s critical that results make it back to the patient’s medical home and are triaged appropriately. This is a great opportunity to do AI the right way together.”

CarePortMD captures and transmits patient vitals, IDx-DR exam results, and other important health information to the patient’s doctor.

“What I’m most excited about is that the retinal exam provides a rich source of information, helping to identify patients who are at highest risk for complications of diabetes,” Ashok Subramanian, MD, the CEO of CarePortMD, said in a release. “If we catch these high-risk patients earlier, it can result in significant savings for the healthcare system and better patient outcomes.”