ARMONK, N.Y., Feb. 13, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- IBM Watson
Health (NYSE: IBM) today announced plans to make a 10-year,
$50 million investment in research
collaborations with two separate academic centers - Brigham and
Women's Hospital, which is a teaching hospital of Harvard Medical School, and Vanderbilt University Medical Center - to advance
the science of artificial intelligence (AI) and its application to
major public health issues.
The scientific collaborations with each institution will focus
on critical health problems that are ideally suited for AI
solutions. Initial areas of study are expected to include the use
of AI to improve the utility of electronic health records (EHRs)[1]
and claims data[2] to address significant public health issues like
patient safety[3], precision medicine[4] and health equity[5]. The
research will also explore physician and patient user experience
and interactions with AI technologies.
"Building on the MIT-IBM Watson Lab announced last year, this
collaboration will include contributions from IBM Watson Health's
longstanding commitment to scientific research and our belief that
working together with the world's leading institutions is the
fastest path to develop, advance, and understand practical
solutions that solve some of the world's biggest health
challenges," said Kyu Rhee, M.D.,
M.P.P., vice president and chief health officer at IBM Watson
Health. "Today, for example, physicians are spending an average of
two hours with their electronic health records and deskwork for
every hour of patient care,[6] a phenomenon the American Medical
Association says is leading to a steady increase in physician
burnout.[7] AI is the most powerful technology we have today to
tackle issues like this one, but there is still a great deal of
work to be done to demystify the real role of AI in healthcare with
practical, proven results and clear-cut best practices. By putting
the full force of our clinical[8] and research team[9] together
with two of the world's leading academic medical centers, we will
dramatically accelerate the development of real-world AI solutions
that improve workflow efficiencies and outcomes."
Drawing on the respective areas of expertise from each
organization, the collaborations will be a joint effort among IBM
Watson Health's newly appointed vice president and chief science
officer, Gretchen Purcell Jackson,
M.D., Ph.D., David Bates, M.D.,
M.S., chief of general internal medicine at Brigham and Women's
Hospital, and professor of medicine at Harvard
Medical School, Kevin
Johnson, M.D., M.S., chair of the department of biomedical
informatics at Vanderbilt University
Medical Center, and Gordon Bernard,
M.D., executive vice president for research, at Vanderbilt
University Medical Center.
"IBM Watson Health has had a long history of leading in
scientific research," said Jackson. "These collaborations give our
scientists at IBM Watson Health the opportunity to work with some
of the best health informatics researchers in the world to advance
the field in the areas of artificial intelligence, clinical
decision support, and implementation science. Medical data is
expected to double every 73 days by 2020[10]. As a practicing
surgeon, I often had to make critical decisions about children's
lives without time to dig for information buried in electronic
health records or sift through thousands of studies in the
literature. Our collaborative research will unlock new insights
that affect broad health stakeholders: from providers, payers,
governments, and life science companies to ultimately the most
important stakeholder, patients, and seek to improve health around
the globe."
"We all know that the future of health belongs to AI but today
health around the globe is siloed and not actionable, making timely
insights difficult to obtain," explained Bates. "Through AI, we
have an opportunity to do better, and our hope is to find new ways
through science and partnerships with industry leaders like Watson
Health to unlock the full potential of AI to improve the utility of
the EHR and claims data to address major public health issues like
patient safety."
Johnson added: "I have committed my career to using health
information technologies to deliver precision medicine, promote
health equity, and understand the human-machine interface and
opportunities to improve public health. As the largest biomedical
informatics department in the U.S., we have been a longstanding
leader in understanding the role and potential of new technologies
like AI. We are excited to work with a leader like IBM Watson
Health and we look forward to expanding the relationship as Watson
Health continues to grow."
For more information about the collaborations or the science
behind AI in health, please visit the website. Interested parties
can also find more information at the IBM Watson Health booth at
the HIMSS conference located at booth # 6459.
About IBM Watson Health
Watson Health is a business unit of IBM that is dedicated to the
development and implementation of cognitive and data-driven
technologies to advance health. Watson Health technologies are
tackling a wide range of the world's biggest health care
challenges, including cancer, diabetes, drug discovery and more.
Learn more.
About Vanderbilt University
Medical Center
Vanderbilt University Medical
Center (VUMC) is one of the nation's leading academic medical
centers and is the largest comprehensive health system in
Tennessee. Its core missions are
the delivery of patient care, performing biomedical research and
training future leaders in health care. VUMC is the recipient of
top accolades by the National Academies, the Magnet Recognition
Program, the Leapfrog Group, and has been named a Top Hospital by
Truven Health Analytics 14 times. In 2018, U.S. News & World
Report named VUMC to the 'Honor Roll' of the nation's top 20
hospitals with 10 nationally-ranked adult specialty programs. In
2018, U.S. News also named the Monroe Carell Jr. Children's
Hospital at Vanderbilt among the
nation's 'Best Children's Hospitals' with 10 out of 10 pediatric
specialty programs nationally ranked. For more information and the
latest news follow Vanderbilt Health on Facebook, LinkedIn,
Twitter, and in the VUMC Reporter.
[1] American Medical Association and Electronic Medical Records:
https://www.ama-assn.org/practice-management/digital/improving-electronic-health-records
[2] EMR + Claims data and the Longitudinal Health Record:
https://www.ibm.com/blogs/watson-health/using-ehr-population-health-whats-missing/
[3] World Health Organization and Patient Safety:
https://www.who.int/patientsafety/en/; Crossing the Quality Chasm:
http://www.nationalacademies.org/hmd/Global/News%20Announcements/Crossing-the-Quality-Chasm-The-IOM-Health-Care-Quality-Initiative.aspx;
Medical Errors are 3rd leading cause of death:
https://www.cnbc.com/2018/02/22/medical-errors-third-leading-cause-of-death-in-america.html
[4] Centers for Disease Control and Precision Medicine:
https://www.cdc.gov/features/precision-medicine/index.html;
Precision Medicine in Cancer Treatment:
https://www.cancer.gov/about-cancer/treatment/types/precision-medicine;
Vanderbilt Precision Medicine Initiative:
https://www.vumc.org/cpm/
[5] World Health Organization and Health Equity:
https://www.who.int/topics/health_equity/en/,
https://www.who.int/healthsystems/topics/equity/en/; American
Public Health Association and Health Equity:
https://www.apha.org/topics-and-issues/health-equity
[6]
https://ehrintelligence.com/news/primary-care-doctors-spending-6-hours-daily-on-ehr-data-entry
[7] https://www.healthdatamanagement.com/news/ama-president-calls-for-end-to-electronic-health-record-abuse
[8]
https://www.ibm.com/blogs/watson-health/do-doctors-fear-ai/
[9]
https://www.ibm.com/blogs/watson-health/watson-health-get-facts/
[10] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3116346/
Contact:
Rachel
Hutman
rachel.hutman@ibm.com
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SOURCE IBM Watson Health