The Digital Patient Journey: Removing Barriers from Screening to Care

The patient journey in healthcare can be anything but straightforward, especially when it comes to early detection of conditions that may not yet present symptoms. For patients at risk for type 1 diabetes (T1D), that journey can be confusing, fragmented, and filled with unnecessary barriers.

As Keith McGee, Senior Director, Channel Management at Sanofi, explained in a recent Brand Insider Summit presentation on the successes achieved in a DTP program run in partnership with ixlayer, the challenge begins with awareness. Stage 2 T1D patients, those who benefit the most from early intervention, often have no symptoms. Even when there is a family history or other risk factors, many healthcare providers are not yet trained to think about T1D screening in the absence of symptoms. But for 40% of people, the first sign of T1D is a life-threatening emergency.

“Everything I learned in pharmacy school about type one diabetes is wrong. I had to reset my thinking and my knowledge of what type one diabetes is,” McGee said. “The pediatricians? Trained wrong. Primary care physicians? Trained wrong. The only people that seemed to really have a good foundational understanding were the endocrinologists.”

Endocrinologists, who are most familiar with the disease, rarely see these patients in time, and access is limited. Wait times for a new endocrinology appointment can stretch six months to a year. Primary care providers and pediatricians may order the wrong tests or only partial panels, and when results do come back, patients and providers alike can be unsure how to interpret them.

“One of the leaders in our organization, her husband is living with type one diabetes, insulin dependent Type one diabetes. She wanted her kids screened because there’s a higher risk for people who have a first or second degree relative. But her physicians would say, ‘You don’t need to, they don’t have any symptoms.’ Or they would get screened with an A1C and go down a type two path instead of type one path,” McGee told the crowd at the Brand Insider Summit. “When I heard that story, I knew we should go direct-to-consumer. This is where we need to meet patients where they are, as we work on educating the healthcare community. So that’s the background for it. So we really wanna make screening accessible to anyone who wants it. That was the goal.”

Identifying Gaps

McGee noted how patients could not get treatment if they weren’t diagnosed, couldn’t get diagnosed if they weren’t screened, and couldn’t get screened if they weren’t educated on risk factors like family history. The gaps in the traditional patient journey started with at-risk patients not getting the information necessary to let them know they were at-risk.

“There’s minimal screening knowledge,” McGee told the audience. “Patients are deterred from screening because their healthcare providers don’t understand.” He went on, saying, “The providers who are doing it, when they get the results back, they don’t really understand what the results mean. So what we’re trying to solve for is to smooth that pathway out.”

McGee outlined the critical obstacles in the pre-digital model:

• Low provider awareness of the need for T1D screening
  
  
• Incomplete or unpleasant screening experiences for patients
  
  
• Confusion and anxiety around test results and next steps
  
  
• Limited appointment availability with appropriate specialists
  
  

Without intervention, many patients simply disengage, resulting in missed opportunities for early detection and prevention.

Designing a Seamless Journey

The solution, McGee decided, was to rethink the process from the patient’s perspective and build a connected digital pathway. He envisioned a process that enabled patients to learn about screening, choose how and where they want to be tested, receive results in clear language, and get connected to appropriate next steps without long delays or unnecessary complexity.

“We didn’t want patients to feel like they were lost or not know what was going on. So patients have the ability to get text messages, they can go to a portal, they get email updates of every step along the way,” McGee said. “Leaning into that customer experience. And it was critical that they understand the results. What are the autoantibodies that are being tested? What do they mean? What is the risk? What do they need to do next after they have the screening? We wanted to make sure they were fully supported all the way through their journey. If a patient has abnormal results, they’ll have a synchronous consult with a physician or a healthcare provider.” 

In the digital patient journey model, patients can:

• Access educational resources and screening options in one place
  
  
• Request screening via their preferred method: at-home collection, lab visits, or in-home phlebotomy
  
  
• Choose between synchronous or asynchronous telehealth consultations with licensed clinicians
  
  
• Receive timely digital updates on the status of their screening
  
  
• Discuss results with a clinician who explains the meaning and potential next steps

This approach not only removes friction but also creates optionality. Patients have real choices at every stage, supporting both engagement and equity.

Collaboration and Execution

McGee stressed that speed and cross-functional collaboration were essential to bringing the vision to life. The project was greenlit in early March with a goal to launch a [minimal viable product] before the June American Diabetes Association meeting. To succeed:

• Every team member had decision-making authority—no “passengers”
  
  
• Legal, regulatory, and compliance teams were involved from the start
  
  
• Multiple partners collaborated in parallel, with clear ownership of responsibilities
  
  
• The team prioritized thoughtful risk-taking to keep the timeline on track
  
  

Results and Lessons Learned

The program has achieved a 92% patient recommendation rate, and so far about 15% of screened patients have abnormal results indicating elevated risk. Critically, these patients now have the information they need to act—whether that means treatment, further evaluation, lifestyle adjustments, or simply being vigilant for symptoms.

McGee emphasized that the success of this initiative wasn’t about technology alone—it was about understanding the things that didn’t work in the existing patient journey, removing obstacles, and building systems that support patients from awareness through action.