CHC '08: With a Vengeance

It just keeps getting better.

After a long night of refining PowerPoint slides, we were reinvigorated this morning with the Keynote Address from Cerner CEO and Co-Founder, Neal Patterson. Demand for rapid change in the current healthcare market has pushed Cerner to adopt a new strategy to include Client Committees and open source projects.

What does that mean?

Client Committees are a collaboration between a participating healthcare institution and a Cerner physician strategist. Together these two forces will pool resources to developed new functionalities based on the various Cerner platforms.

Open source means that Cerner has decided to make the source code for the programs freely available to their clients. Giving clients the freedom to innovate and customize Cerner products to their needs.

Demonstrating (but not demonstrating) the possibilities!!

Neal Patterson made it clear that the products they would discuss coming out of the new business strategy would not be demonstrated during the keynote. However, he didn't actually define what they were doing on stage...and for lack of a better word, it looked like a demonstration to me.

Patterson was looking for a WOW-factor from the work presented during the keynote. Dr. Mike LeFerve (UMHC Chief Medical Informatics Officer) and Brian Lancaster (Cerner Director of Physician Stategy) showcased the work that University of Missouri has worked hard to development. The main focus during their showcase was the patient & condition summary screens. Links below allow you to download presentation related to what was presented.

The other notable demonstration the new launch of iAware. The new tool brings the meaning of patient-centered care to a whole new playing field. There are two dynamic screens in the patient's bedroom. The mainscreen is a 50" LCD monitor with various "Cerner Gadgets" displaying the patient's current status. The second display is 15" display on a pivot designed for patient use. The really interesting aspect of these two monitor is that they adjust to the environment around them.

During a mock encounter between a nurse and a patient, a warning pop-up displayed on the 15" screen. It informed the patient that the beeping they were hearing was normal and it was a simply notification that they IV medication was almost empty and should be attended to. The nurse is then notified and enters with the replacement IV bag. On the patient 15" screen a photo, name, and credentials of the nurse walking into the patient's room are displayed. The patient can then use the 15" touch display to look up a minutae of facts regarding the medication being administered and other facts regarding their care. The large display behind the patient (designed for nurse and clinician use), then adjust display the new medication and monitor the progress/level of the medication administration. WOW!!!!

After the exciting keynote, presentations were given throughout the day explain the "behind the scenes" work that took place to create, development, and maintain the various demonstrations.

If you'd like to see the three PowerPoint presentation, follow the links below.

To have a general overview of the Medical Home project presented by Dr. Mike LeFevre, Dr. Jeff Belden, Dr. Hal Williamson, and Marilee Bomar, APRN, CLICK HERE

To have an in depth discussion regarding the development and creation of Discern Analytics with Patient & Condition Summary Screens developed by Dr. Karl Kochendorfer, Jared Coberly, and Andrew Hutson, CLICK HERE

To review the possibilities for creating rules and summary screens using Cerner Discern Desktop presented by Jared Coberly and Scott Barger, CLICK HERE