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The medical device integration tool can deliver data to clinicians within Epic’s workflow.

Hear how a one-of-a-kind non-profit genomics research institute is leveraging its multi-cloud strategy to open access to its research in order to drive precision medicine from research to clinical application.

The company will be showing an open scalable platform for managing devices, centralizing storage and providing on-demand analytics, among other capabilities at HIMSS19.

Microsoft and Allscripts subsidiary Veradigm announced a partnership to develop a new product that would help researchers conduct studies via Allscripts cloud-based electronic health record (EHR). WHY IT MATTERS Allscripts’ payer and life sciences-focused business unit, Veradigm, has been tapped to work with Microsoft to design the integrated research model — expected to run on point-of-care technology platforms, the companies said. The partnership will broaden Allscripts’ cloud-based EHR to include automated “match-making” between study protocols, patients and providers who may qualify for studies. The effort will also include pilot programs to inform the development of the model, the companies said. Allscripts and Microsoft said they are hoping the new product will improve time to market for new drug therapies, thus slashing costs on research and development. THE BIGGER TREND This partnership follows FDA’s guidance, issued last July, on how to use electronic health records for clinical investigations — in addition to, FDA’s “Framework for FDA’s Real-World Evidence Program,” released last month, which describes the use of data captured through routine care delivery as useful in supporting new drug approval. This isn’t Microsoft’s first inroad into research. Last March at HIMSS18, Peter Lee, corporate vice president for Microsoft AI and Research, highlighted advancements it is has made through a partnership with St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, where St. Jude made use of Microsoft Azure’s cloud computing service to process genomic data. Genomics is just one area for Microsoft investment, both in areas of research and in day-to-day use in hospitals, that used to be considered futuristic, we reported. Hints of Allscripts movement in this direction came Last August, when following an earnings call, Allscripts CEO Paul Black emphasized the company’s plans for diversification in the healthcare space. Black said Allscripts planned to do this through the growth of its payer and life sciences business and analytics offerings to drive additional value from pharmaceutical clients and R&D spending, in general. ON THE RECORD “Just as rideshare organisations such as Lyft replaced the traditional specialized taxi driver and dispatch service with technology enabled drivers, we envision a network of technology enabled research clinicians providing an alternative to the roles associated within the traditional clinical trial operating model,” Veradigm vice-president and general manager Stephanie Reisinger said.  This article first appeared on Healthcare iT News.

Ambulance Victoria will soon deploy a predictive analytics platform that gives its paramedics access to real-time information, enhancing and accelerating its decision making as the need for emergency services grows. The platform, supported by Microsoft Azure, aims to support machine learning, data mining, AI and contextual models for richer data insights that the agency can use to better its services. The platform also has capabilities to store the data for use when needed and provides a single pane of glass for Ambulance Victoria staff to access data from multiple applications and across its different environments. Ambulance Victoria Chief Information Officer Mark Gardiner told HITNA that the proposed predictive analytics program will add to its current business intelligence capabilities by analysing its current data to better allocate resources. “Predictive analytics will enable Ambulance Victoria to use a single platform to combine data currently used… with other data sets such as weather and traffic patterns to better predict where resources are best allocated,” Gardiner said. This helps staff with their decision-making, by identifying which routes and areas they should avoid as a result of weather or traffic, for example, so as to get to patients in a quicker time and deliver on the services required. Ambulance Victoria currently uses some business intelligence capabilities using a Microsoft Dynamics-based system named Ambulance Victoria Reference Data Set (AVRDS) to manage its data. But according to the pre-hospital emergency care and ambulance services provider, the data is “manually handled and carries significant lag” particularly around quality and resource or supply data, doing “little or nothing to enable decision support”. “Ambulance Victoria currently lacks capabilities and tools to monitor and improve performance as well as support divisions in real-time, making the existing technology platforms one of the key challenges in delivering better patient outcomes,” the agency recently said. [Read more: Ambulance Victoria app fast-tracks urgent care to people suffering cardiac arrests | EMRs and the Royal Flying Doctor Service – how the iconic institution approaches innovation] “As a modern ambulance service, Ambulance Victoria focuses on continual improvement. This includes looking at any new or emerging technologies that are available to enhance what we already do with a focus on delivering the right patient care, at the right time, at the right place,” Gardiner said. “By harnessing all available data into a single platform, Ambulance Victoria will increase its ability to meet the growing demand for emergency services and deliver better patient outcomes. “Once the tender is complete Ambulance Victoria expects to begin rolling out the platform over five years.” Ambulance Australia has picked Microsoft Azure as the platform in delivering predictive analytics and is now on the lookout for a primary platform supplier to execute and support the platform securely, in addition to managing the data. It is also looking to appoint a panel of suppliers that Ambulance Australia said “will help deliver solutions and expedite the delivery of new capabilities” like data dashboards and data ingestion.

The tool will combine Experian's patient ID management technology with Change's nationwide Intelligent Healthcare Network.

Mobile data is about to get a lot faster at the Rush System for Health in Chicago. The hospital system has partnered with AT&T to become what it says is the first in the nation to use a standards-based 5G network in a healthcare setting. Rush is also implementing AT&T's Multi-Access Edge Computing, a cloud-based service that will help the hospital system "manage its cellular traffic over both its local network and its wide area network." "We strongly believe 5G is a game-changing technology that when fully implemented will help us support better hospital operations as well as provide the highest quality patient and staff experience," said Dr. Shafiq Rab, senior vice president and chief information officer at Rush. WHY IT MATTERS A faster and more-responsive mobile network is critical in maintaining a large clinically integrated health system of hospitals and other care providers. Rab imagines a scenario where a doctor can perform a remote video consult or download a large lab file in seconds. Healthcare systems that are looking to futureproof or implement cutting-edge technologies rely on high speed and low latency IT networks to facilitate the rapid exchange of data or to allow clinicians to perform more detailed work from greater distances. "The technology will enhance access to care, even from long distances, while also helping to decrease costs and improve efficiency. The cutting-edge applications we're implementing need a fast, reliable network to support them," said Rab. THE LARGER TREND 5G is more than just an upgrade of 3 or 4G. It encompasses a multitude of communications technologies including cellular, Wi-Fi and intelligent edge services. It promises a massive boost in transfer speeds that things like distributed computing or IoT devices in healthcare need to reach their full potential. Remote medicine, while hardly a new phenomenon, is growing at leaps and bounds both in terms of the quality of data that can be captured, sent and computed, as well as the speed at which it can be transferred. Greater network speeds mean that the trend of "anytime, anywhere" medicine will continue to grow. ON THE RECORD "AT&T believes ultimately 5G's fast speeds and ultra-low latency will transform all businesses – and Rush is leading the way in healthcare," said Mo Katibeh, chief marketing officer, AT&T Business. "Imagine a hospital where rooms are intelligently scheduled, patient care is enhanced with artificial intelligence and augmented reality is used in training medical students. It sounds like the future, but it's not that far off." Benjamin Harris is a Maine-based freelance writer and and former new media producer for HIMSS Media. Twitter: @BenzoHarris.

Big Blue's collaboration the nation's largest Parkinson's foundation aims to apply AI to a vast dataset with the aim of learning more about how the disease grows.