A breakthrough decision support solution for docs

During his speech tonight at the Web 2.0 Summit in San Francisco, GE Chairman and CEO Jeff Immelt Immelt is unveiling a potentially game-changing computerized system that will give real-time clinical data and treatment options to doctors — right at a patient’s side. Developed using three decades of clinical information from the Intermountain Healthcare system of hospitals, it provides doctors faster access to current research. In the audio clip below, Dr. Graham Hughes, who is Chief Medical Officer & Vice President of Product Strategy for GE Healthcare’s Enterprise IT Solutions division, provides a walkthrough of what doctors would see. Click on the full screen button at the bottom right of the player to enlarge it.

For example, a doctor who is making patient rounds can pull up lab results as needed rather than go to each patient’s records. While checking on one patient, alerts are signaled when a particular reading is out of normal range — and behind the buttons is a flood of information on each patient, including case histories and best care recommendations.

Driven by technology that enables collaborations with leading medical institutions, including Intermountain Healthcare and Mayo Clinic, the solution — which is part of GE’s healthymagination technology showcase currently underway in New York City — enables even the smallest and most remote healthcare clinics to evaluate their current approach to patient care against constantly evolving standards. The end result is that patients everywhere may benefit from current treatment options. Prior to this development, the flow of information from “bench to bedside” through traditional means of medical journal publication, continuing education classes and symposia, could take upwards of 17 years.

“This is a huge leap forward in healthcare IT,” said Marc Probst, chief information officer of Intermountain. “By the time this project is fully realized, we will be sharing top quality research that can be put into practice across the globe, helping eliminate unnecessary variation in diagnosis and treatment. This innovation could change the face of patient care as we know it.”

At your fingertips: A pilot program will be launched at Intermountain in November and GE will unveil the full solution at the March meeting of the Healthcare Information Management and Systems Society.

* Read today’s announcement
* Register to watch live streams of the Web 2.0 Summit in San Francisco — and check back tonight for more updates from Jeff Immelt’s speech.

Read our recent stories from the new healthymagination technology showcase:
* “Tackling access with Brivo imaging technologies”
* “The business of bringing healthymagination to market”
* “At the showcase: Health by design and window tweets”
* “Scintillating tech: The world’s 1st high-def CT scanner”
* “Healthymagination tech showcase kicks off in NYC”
* Read the announcement about Jeff Immelt’s press event tomorrow at the showcase