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For insurers and clinical networks

Hear from every patient. Call the ones who need it.

AfterCareNet moves routine follow-up after cancer surgery and radiotherapy from phone calls to short scheduled check-ins and validated PROMs. Practice nurses work a list of only the patients who need action, and every episode yields outcome data you can compare across practices.

See how it worksPartner on a pilot
  • Free for patients
  • Nothing to install
  • Patient data stays in Australia

1SMS reminder

Personal, plain and short. Says how long it takes.

2Patient check-in

One question per screen, large text, and the safety note one tap away on every screen.

3Nurse worklist

Red and amber alerts first, each with the rule that fired. Routine check-ins need no call.

AfterCareNet is not monitored after hours and does not diagnose or advise on treatment. Each practice's own clinicians act on every alert, in practice hours.

Example screens. Illustrative data, not real patients.

The problem

Every routine follow-up call costs nurse time, whether or not anything is wrong.

After cancer surgery, practices check on patients by phone until the first review. During radiotherapy, weekly reviews end just before side effects peak. And the outcome data that shows the care was good is collected unevenly, if at all.

1–2 weeks

after radiotherapy ends is when side effects are often worst. Weekly reviews have stopped, and skin review is commonly 4 to 8 weeks out.

Cancer Council NSW · eviQ

46%

12-month PROM completion in the prostate cancer registry for 2021–22. The data to show outcomes is patchy even where a registry exists.

PCOR-ANZ annual report, 2024

60%

of 91 clinicians from 56 ANZ oncology practices say they collect PROMs, mostly in metro centres. The authors point to limited resources.

ANZ clinician survey, 2024

Two ways to follow up

Call every patient, or hear from every patient.

Same nurses. Same patients. A different default.

TODAY

The phone list

Nurses ring every patient on a schedule, whether or not anything is wrong.

Worried patients wait for the call, or chase the practice themselves.

Radiotherapy side effects peak after the weekly reviews end.

PROMs are collected unevenly, so outcomes are hard to show.

WITH AFTERCARENET

The exception list

Patients answer short check-ins from an SMS link. Under three minutes, nothing to install.

Rules your specialist approves sort every answer. A routine check-in needs no call.

Practice nurses work one list: red and amber alerts, missed check-ins, photos and messages.

Validated PROMs arrive on schedule, from a baseline taken before treatment starts.

How it works

One episode, from booking to GP letter.

Each patient is enrolled on one pathway for one treatment. Your specialist approves the pathway once. The schedule does the rest.

  1. 1

    Before treatment

    • 01Enrol at booking

      Reception or a nurse enrols the patient on a pathway in under two minutes, using details already in the practice's software.

      Practice team · under 2 min

    • 02Baseline PROM

      The patient completes a validated questionnaire before treatment starts, so every later answer has a starting point.

      Patient · SMS link

  2. 2

    During recovery or radiotherapy

    Repeats on the pathway schedule

    • 03Short check-ins

      Red-flag questions come first. Patients can add a wound or skin photo. The safety note is one tap away on every screen.

      Patient · under 3 min

    • 04Rules sort every answer

      Rules your specialist approved raise red or amber alerts, and each alert shows why it fired. Routine answers need no call.

      Specialist-approved rules

    • 05Nurses work the list

      Red alerts get contact within one hour, amber within one business day, in practice hours. Every contact gets a note.

      Practice nurse

  3. 3

    After the pathway

    • 06Milestone PROMs

      Questionnaires at 6 and 12 months take minutes, and feed practice audit now and registry submission later.

      Patient · 6 and 12 months

    • 07GP summary letter

      When the pathway ends, the GP gets what happened, current problems, what to watch and who to call.

      GP · letter at handover

Who it's for

Built around the nurse.
Useful to everyone.

The practice nurse is the primary daily user, so the practice side is built around their worklist. Everyone else works from the same patient record.

PRACTICE NURSES

Work by exception.

A routine check-in needs no call. When an alert fires, you see the rule, the answers behind it and the trend: enough context to call in under a minute.

A practice nurse on a phone call at a desk, with a worklist on the screen.

Example screen. Illustrative data, not real patients.

  • Patients and carers

    Know what's normal, report problems early, and always know who to call. Carers can answer for the patient, marked as theirs.

  • Specialists

    Approve pathways and rules once. See only the escalations that need a doctor, plus outcomes for audit, CPD and registries.

  • Insurers and networks

    Comparable outcomes and measured nurse time across every participating practice, for commissioning, audit and registries.

  • GPs

    A short letter at handover: what happened, current problems, what to watch and who to call. No login needed.

The evidence

Promising trials.
One big gap.

Electronic symptom monitoring has been tested in randomised trials, mostly in advanced cancer during systemic therapy. It transfers only in part to recovery after curative surgery or radiotherapy.

  • 34% vs 41%

    ED visits, reporting vs usual care

    Basch et al. randomised 766 patients. ED visits fell and quality of life declined less.

    JCO 2016

  • 31.2 vs 26.0

    Median survival in months, same trial

    In the same trial, median overall survival was 31.2 months with weekly reporting and 26.0 months with usual care.

    JAMA 2017

  • 91.5%

    Weekly surveys completed

    PRO-TECT, across 52 practices treating metastatic cancer, cut ED visits to 1.02 from 1.30 per patient over 12 months. No survival difference.

    Nature Medicine 2025

None of these trials measured nurse time.

In Basch's trial, nurses responded to 77% of alerts with telephone counselling. After lumpectomy, one US tracker raised alerts for 29% of 8,723 patients. At rates like that, alert thresholds set the nurse workload. So v1 caps alert volume, measures net nurse time, and treats the workload claim as a hypothesis until the pilot proves it.

Being straight with you

No AI. No night shift.
No doubt about who to call.

Safety in v1 rests on three things: the same safety instruction for every patient, rules clinicians approve and can read, and a clinician acting on every red and amber alert in practice hours.

What it is

  • Check-ins and validated PROMs, by SMS link.

    Short, scheduled and plain English, at about a Year 6 to 8 reading level. Large text and no time limits.

  • A worklist the practice's own clinicians act on.

    Red alerts get contact within one hour and amber within one business day, in practice hours. An end-of-day sweep clears red items before closing.

  • Rules your specialist approves and can read.

    Every alert shows the rule that fired, the answers behind it, its source and the pathway version.

  • Patient data stays in Australia.

    Hosted onshore. Patients and carers use it free.

What it isn't

  • Not an emergency or 24/7 service.

    Nobody watches the worklist after hours, and every check-in says so. Patients see who to call, including your after-hours number, 000 and Lifeline.

  • No AI in v1.

    No language models, risk scores, image analysis or voice agents. Any later AI waits for a TGA intended-purpose review, a clinical safety case and pilot data on nurse time.

  • No advice that changes with answers.

    The safety instruction is the same for everyone on a pathway, approved by the specialist.

  • Not a nursing service, and not a diagnosis.

    No treatment recommendations, prescribing or test results. Your staff stay in charge.

The pilot

Help us prove it across your network.

We're looking for a funding partner, a health insurer or state clinical network, and three specialist practices. Practice nurses log four weeks of follow-up calls as a baseline. Then we go live for twelve weeks and measure each practice against its own numbers.

LAUNCH PATHWAYS

  • Breast cancer surgery
  • Breast radiotherapy
  • Radical prostatectomy
  • Prostate radiotherapy
Partner on a pilot Talk to the team

PILOT TARGETS

Hypotheses to test, not claims.

30%

less net nurse follow-up time per patient-week by week 12, alert handling included

  • 80%

    of check-ins need no staff contact at all

  • 80%

    of enrolled patients complete a baseline PROM before treatment starts

  • 0

    red alerts left without patient contact at the end of the day

Measured by practice: four-week baseline time log, then contact times and alert timers. Safety is a hard guardrail, not a trade-off.