Cloud Computing

Mercy Technology Services, the IT division of the sprawling St. Louis-based health system, has developed a new cloud-based imaging platform and is commercializing it for other hospitals to deploy. The picture archiving communication system comprises best-of-breed enterprise viewer, vendor neutral archive, workflow orchestrator, speech recognition and reporting, according to Mercy, bundled as a secure software-as-a-service model aimed a small and midsize hospitals. It's aimed as a way to help hospitals drive efficiency with their imaging processes, replacing outdated and far-flung PACS systems, that require radiologists to spend too much time tracking down imaging reports or switching between stations. Cloud-based PACS can allow for big time savings and cost efficiencies at cash-strapped small hospitals, such as the one in rural Kansas we reported on this past month, which was able to cut its imaging costs in half. Mercy, which operates 40 hospitals of various sizes across four states, consolidated its own imaging platform with help from MTS, distilling nine legacy PACS systems into a single hosted technology. The system, which combines server-side image processing from Visage, a workflow orchestrator from Medicalis and speech recognition from Nuance, has helped radiologists at the health system decrease turnaround time for their reports by up to 50 percent. Mercy is a longtime health IT leader, and one of the earliest adopters of Epic. Its technology knowhow over the years has enabled it to innovate new advances in telehealth, advanced analytics and more as it has scaled up its infrastructure. It's also allowed it to be able to share its expertise and tools with other providers. Its Epic accreditation enables allows it to share Epic and other technology with smaller hospitals. "We're a little bit unique from the standpoint that Mercy sells its IT services to other providers," Mercy CIO Gil Hoffman told Healthcare IT News in 2017. "We have commercialized our IT, and that has taken a lot of work, bringing some other health systems not only into our Epic services but our hosting services as well." Now, as the latest example of its ability to commercialize and host IT systems for other hospitals, MTS will offer this PACS-as-a-service, whether bundled or by the component, to hospitals across the country. "Having everything together and viewable with the click of a button – all prior studies, all modalities – means radiologists aren’t waiting and neither are patients," said Steve Bollin, Mercy’s vice president of radiology support services, in a statement For his part, Hoffman touted the PACS as an efficient and affordable platform, developed as a result of Mercy's own efforts to innovate its technology and workflows. .jumbotron{ background-image: url("https://www.healthcareitnews.com/sites/default/files/u2231/Innovation-month-jumbotron.jpg"); background-size: cover; color: white; } .jumbotron h2{ color: white; } Focus on Innovation In September, we take a deep dive into the cutting-edge development and disruption of healthcare innovation. Twitter: @MikeMiliardHITN Email the writer: mike.miliard@himssmedia.com

Readers pointed to the incumbent’s domain expertise and broad member base outweighing Amazon’s innovative nature.

Executives explain how the developer initiatives work and why they’re fueling innovation and shaping future direction of their platforms.

Former CEO Jonathan Bush could receive $4.8 million if he helps with the sale of the cloud IT company, according to a report that shows Elliott partnering with Bain Capital.

The tariffs being proposed by the administration of President Donald Trump, particularly those on certain Chinese imports, could harm the booming cloud computing industry in the United States, undermine U.S. leadership in the sector, and harm innovation – not least in healthcare. That's according to a new report from the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation, the influential nonprofit tech policy think tank, based in Washington, D.C. By stifling the development of fast-evolving cloud technology, the tariffs could put the U.S. at a competitive disadvantage and adversely impact consumers – and, potentially patients, according to the study, which spotlights some specific initiatives that could be affected by import taxes. "For businesses large and small alike, in industries ranging from agriculture and manufacturing to healthcare and transportation, cloud computing has become an indispensable platform technology critical to their success," ITIF researchers wrote in the report. The U.S. economy has become utterly dependent on cloud computing, with 93 percent of businesses nationwide – including most hospitals and health systems – relying on some 3 million data centers, the study showed. And, of course, innovation in the cloud space is enabling huge advances in technology offerings and healthcare outcomes. But Trump's desired tariffs on Chinese imports would put a crimp in the pipeline of key components that fuel that innovation, and could have four specific negative consequences for the industry, the study argues: Higher prices for business and consumers using cloud technology; Fewer new hires, less R&D for product innovation and slowing business expansion as cloud providers seek to cut costs; Higher costs to provide cloud services from the U.S. could leader to other international locations more price-competitive; Disruption of global supply chains for the manufacture of IT – something that "wouldn’t be easily reinvented in the short-term without significant detriment and dislocation to U.S industry." As the report's lead author, Stephen Ezell, ITIF's vice president for global innovation policy, explained: "While the tariffs were proposed to counteract unfair Chinese trade practices and improve U.S. competitiveness, they in fact hurt U.S. cloud computing competitiveness. It’s critically important to contest Chinese innovation mercantilism, but the administration’s proposed tariffs on key capital goods imports are the wrong way to go about it. They threaten U.S. leadership in cloud computing and stunt U.S. economic growth." To help make its point, the ITIF study pointed as an example to San Francisco-based Numerate, which has a healthcare focus, and is using cloud-powered analytics to help improve the drug-design and innovate precision medicine approaches for cardiology. "Numerate’s algorithms provide predictive models for molecular properties with accuracies comparable to laboratory testing, enabling scientists to search through billions of compounds to rapidly and efficiently identify those with the highest probability of activity against a specific  disease target," according to the report. The company's uses cloud computing to help it harness "exploding amounts of empirical data to clear the way for scientists to design new therapies in the cloud," leading to new approaches that could "dramatically reduce the cost of pharmaceutical development and expand the number of therapies that can be created and tested by moving medical research away  from a 'hit-and-hope' world of trial-and-error guesswork." But new tariffs could slow that work, ITIF maintained – and work similar to it at life sciences companies, health IT vendors, hospitals and health systems. "Many Americans will feel the impacts of the proposed tariffs on cloud computing through increased prices, lost jobs, and decreased economic opportunity," said the report's co-author Caleb Foote, ITIF research assistant. "The administration should pursue alternative policy measures that don’t raise the cost of key productivity- and innovation-enhancing capital goods and services." .jumbotron{ background-image: url("http://www.himss.org/sites/himssorg/files/u351641/BigData-Forum2-June2018-712.jpg"); background-size: cover; color: white; } .jumbotron h2{ color: white; } Big Data & Healthcare Analytics Forum The Boston forum to focus on effective pop health management, AI and precision medicine Oct. 22-23. Twitter: @MikeMiliardHITN Email the writer: mike.miliard@himssmedia.com

Deloitte and Vineti announced that they are now working together to integrate and scale their technology platforms – for supply chain and patient engagement, respectively – to give various precision medicine stakeholders easier access to emerging cellular therapies. Vineti, launched as a commercial venture by the Mayo Clinic in partnership with GE, develops  a configurable cloud-based platform designed to improve patient access to cell therapies and genomic medicine. Deloitte's ConvergeHEALTH Patient Connect analytics technology helps connect health systems, pharmaceutical companies, medical device vendors and other groups working to innovate precision medicine. By integrating the Vineti and ConvergeHEALTH technologies, the two companies aim to offer life science researchers, healthcare providers, IT vendors and patients with a more unified platform for personalized medicine. Vineti's software, which is currently deployed at more than 65 leading medical centers, helps users align, manage and integrate major steps in the complex cell and gene therapy process. ConvergeHEALTH Patient Connect, used by 300,000 patients worldwide, is a suite of software tools to help enable actionable insights derived real-world information, evidence and experience. Using both, healthcare and life sciences professionals will be able to innovate and scale up personalized therapies, connect with other health providers and enable broader patient access to precision therapies. "Personalized medicine is changing all aspects of the industry including the way patients, providers and life sciences innovators interact and we believe that a solution that contains both Vineti and PatientConnect will bring an unprecedented level of real-time support and fidelity to control supply chain and care pathway management," said Chris Zant, ConvergeHEALTH chief digital officer, in a statement. .jumbotron{ background-image: url("http://mobihealthnews.com/sites/default/files/u751/Innovation-month-jumbotron-1.jpg"); background-size: cover; color: white; } .jumbotron h2{ color: white; } Focus on Innovation In September, we take a deep dive into the cutting-edge development and disruption of healthcare innovation. Twitter: @MikeMiliardHITN Email the writer: mike.miliard@himssmedia.com

Precision Innovation Network has selected Splice Machine’s big data platform to develop its Treatment Advisor application, to be hosted in an AWS cloud.

Several news stories have questioned what reported struggles with the cognitive platform mean for the larger idea of AI in healthcare.

Republic County Hospital in Kansas freed itself from buying new equipment every few years and improved the software’s ease of use for clinicians.

Speaking at the White House, she said the potential of what unleashed health data could do for the country is "really unimaginable."