Combining AI with Professional Services to Achieve Smart Healthcare that is Patient-Centric
TAIPEI, Taiwan, March 15, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Microsoft has
invested deeply in artificial intelligence (AI) research for many years. By applying billions of sets of big data and machine
learning in the research process, Microsoft has successfully expanded AI technologies to the field of manufacturing, retail, the
service sector, and even healthcare. After the introduction of HealthVault, a personal health management service platform,
Microsoft has once again integrated robots, voice recognition, and cognitive services, thus successfully launching Microsoft
Health Bot and Microsoft StaffHub. All these three applications offer deep personalization, conversational intelligence, and
world knowledge to medical personnel and patients, which optimize medical SOPs and introduce medical resources to every
household, thereby facilitating the healthcare industry in achieving digital transformation. With the premise of complying with
international standards of information security, Microsoft's AI-related healthcare service will effectively elevate quality of
care and promote positive doctor-patient relationships.
The Internet of Things -- The Key to Achieving Care Everywhere
The vision of achieving digital transformation in the healthcare industry was revealed in the World Economic Forum. With the
25 billion (this number is expected to multiply within five years) connected devices within the extant IoT, far-reaching and
ubiquitous high-speed data transfer and connected devices, cheaper and smaller sensors, low-cost data storages, and revolutionary
analytical and machine learning technology, the face of the healthcare industry will undergo extensive changes in the coming
decade. The employment of telemedicine and the Connected Homes Program will make "care anywhere" a possibility. The healthcare
industry will also act as a leading force in this process of transformation. In the face of becoming an aging society, low birth
rate and the possible bankruptcy of the national healthcare system in Taiwan, it's critical to
allocate and utilize medical resources efficiently to achieve the goal of aging gracefully in a fulfilling way while providing
affordable medical services for all. This is the core issue to be solved by digital transformation powered by technologies.
"As population aging continues to accelerate, Taiwan's aging index reached 100.18 for the
first time during last month; the aged population is now larger than the young age population. The National Development Council
also estimates that the percentage of aging population will exceed 14% by 2018 and 20% by 2020. By that time, Taiwan will officially become a hyper-aged society. Prolonged life expectancy, the prevalence of chronic
illnesses, and limited medical resources are issues that the healthcare system and society as a whole must address as soon as
possible" says Steven Shaw, General Manager of Microsoft Taiwan. "As the aging population, has
become more active in the society, Microsoft Taiwan has also devoted itself to developing a more comprehensive medical ecosystem.
With the aid of technology such as AI, natural speech, and robots, time spent on waiting to receive medical care, diagnosis,
prescribing, and applying for healthcare coverage is decreased and the processes are optimized. These types of technology can
effective assist medical personnel in monitoring the patient's condition after appointments, which leads to more effective home
healthcare, a decrease in the number of hospital visits or examinations, and an overall reduction in wasted medical resources.
Furthermore, patients are able to enjoy remote healthcare in the comfort of their homes. For both service providers and users of
the healthcare system, the application of new technologies paves the way to achieving equal and efficient medical resource
allocation."
Digital Transformation in the Healthcare Industry -- Four Dimensions Centered on Elevating Healthcare Quality and Improving
Engagement
Digital transformation involves re-centering the operations of an organization through the use of digital, social, mobile, and
emerging technologies to reinvent the ways of thinking and work. Visionary leadership, clashes of different thinking and the
encouragement of innovation to promote new business models are the key to the success of digital transformation. On the other
hand, enterprises can integrate the digitization of their assets and employ technology to optimize the user experience of
employees, customers, vendors and partners so on.
Taking Hong Kong's Department of Health and Hospital Authority for examples, Microsoft Asia
Healthcare Lead Danny Yeo has identified five primary problems that hospitals now face: (1) doctors travel frequently among
hospitals need to access the medical cases and doctor training materials, which are siloed within hospitals; (2) decentralized
and distributed locations and limited IT support; (3) medical staff use Whatsapp, a consumer messaging APP that IT cannot
control; (4) IT personnel are unable to manage aged containerized APPs on Linux, and are always on alert for fear of unexpected
failures; and (5) IT personnel are unable to track the dependency of problematic apps and cannot anticipate which systems are
affected. Therefore, the promotion of digital transformation to record, manage, analyze and respond to various circumstances is
the primary goal of digital transformation.
In the face of the many obstacles in digital transformation, Microsoft upholds the concept of "Mobile First Cloud First" and
propose four major dimensions in digital transformation. The four dimensions are: engage your patients, empower
your care teams, optimize your clinical operational effectiveness, and transform the care continuum. In addition to
digital healthcare, precision medicine, and information security, the allocation of human resources of medical personnel and the
relationship of patients and medical personnel are all tasks to be undertaken in the digital transformation of healthcare
industry. Through digital transformation, data can be transformed into insights that can be further utilized by medical personnel
and optimize medical processes while providing the necessary healthcare resources to patients. This will not only help facilitate
medical communications and but also improve the quality of medical care and ultimately improve the relationship of patients and
medical personnel.
HealthVault, Microsoft StaffHub, and Health Bot Offer Customized Services and Experiences Through General Medical
Interactions
The prevalence of AI facilitates the centralized management of data, enhances communication convenience and security, and
ensures the stability of medical applications. Subsequently, problems that stem from inadequate human and financial resources in
hospitals can be effectively mitigated by optimizing processes, reducing manual data entry, and conserving the time and labor
costs required in physical data transmission.
"Microsoft's HealthVault, Microsoft StaffHub, and Health Bot aim to incorporate AI into medical procedures and data management
to analyze and optimize doctor-staff interactions, creating value-added applications. These services not only bring professional
medical assistance from the hospital to patients' homes, allowing every patient to receive hospital-quality care via connected
devices but also resolves the misallocation of medical resources and ambiguity of medical processes," Microsoft Asia Healthcare
Lead Danny Yeo explained, "With Microsoft's enterprise grade security protection and it's compliance with various Medical IT and
Cloud Security standards, users can ensure their sensitive data is fully protected and can be exchanged and shared in a secure
environment, which will also motivate patients to be willing to share their personal medical data for medical personnel to
provide more customized healthcare or medical research and further improve the quality of healthcare services."
With the inclusion of AI applications, services like HealthVault, Microsoft StaffHub, and Health Bot create unprecedented
opportunities for users. These services are not only more intuitive but also have the potential of providing even more customized
services. A few examples are listed below:
HealthVault: Centralized storage, management, application, and exchange of personal and family members' health data
information
HealthVault can assist users in the following four health management categories:
- Organize your family's health information: Track your drug use, medical history, blood pressure, symptoms and
indisposition, allergies, physical conditions, physical examination results, and radiology reports and images.
- Be better prepared for doctor visits and unexpected emergencies: Authorize emergency staff to access your health data over
the Internet via computer, smartphone, and/or tablet devices.
- Create a more patient-centric and complete picture of year health: Access your examination results, prescription history,
and treatment records. Authorize laboratories, pharmacies, hospitals, and clinics to upload your health data to HealthVault or
upload data yourself for easy tracking of chronic illnesses. HealthVault offers trend charts and a search mode, allowing you to
compile a complete medical report for your doctor. You can also store medical images and share them with medical staff or
people you trust, thereby creating a health management support network.
- Achieve your fitness goals: The weight management dashboard assists in managing weight at fitness objectives by tracking
weight, activity, and food intake. You can also set specific goals or check your progress. HealthVault can be connected to
wearable devices to track exercise and training. HealthVault provides reminders to help you stay positive and on track. You can
then adjust your workout based on your health data to maximize effectiveness. You can also post your progress on social media
to share your weight-loss, activity, or calorie-burn results with your friends.
Microsoft StaffHub: Staff scheduling, rounds scheduling, and instant communications
Microsoft StaffHub is a cloud-based platform that works across all your devices. It enables staff workers and their managers
to manage time, communicate with their teams, and share content. Managerial staff such as doctors and head nurses can create
schedules or projects to consolidate relevant members into a team. They can then instantaneously update relevant activities and
schedules. The platform can be used to manage staff needs and share case notes, images, reports, and charts across different
mobile platforms. In addition, nurses and on-the-go staff member can view their upcoming schedules, swap a shift, or request time
off. They can also communicate with other team members individually, in a small group, or across the entire team, view content,
and take appropriate actions.
Microsoft Health Bot: A robot with conversational intelligence
Microsoft Health Bot provides deep personalization, conversational intelligence, and world knowledge for initial patient
triage. The Health Bot is completely customizable. It is built with advanced customization options and an extensible framework.
Partners have the flexibility to tailor the bot to their unique patient scenarios and can easily integrate third-party endpoints,
like EMRs and patient portals. Health Bot offers support for interactive diagnostic symptom checkers, layperson natural language,
and multi-turn dialog with users, and it learns from previous interactions. The information sources for conversational
intelligence derives from HealthVault (which provides information on lab results, medications, and wearable data), Cortana (which
enables access to deep patient knowledge in multiple areas), partner data sources, Bing (which provides local information, maps,
and crowd search data), and CDC/WHO/NHS/NIH databases.
"Using Microsoft Health Bot, users can now access their health data conveniently, instantaneously, and in their
preferred language. Insurance companies can visualize their expenses using client reports and reinforce client-company
relations." Microsoft Asia Healthcare Lead Danny Yeo indicated, "According to a market report released by eMarketer in 2015, 80%
of the participants were willing to share their health data to improve medical care, 59% were willing to provide their health
data for medical research, and 52% were willing to share their health data to obtain a deduction in insurance premium. These
outcomes imply that patients are willing to provide their personal health data to hospitals or insurance companies if it benefits
personal healthcare. The next step in the digital transformation of the healthcare industry is identifying and resolving
challenges, establishing partnerships, proposing conceptual verification models, and executing pilot programs, thereby creating
robust and refined medical services that satisfy patients' special needs."
About Microsoft
Microsoft (Nasdaq "MSFT" @microsoft) is the leading platform and productivity company for the mobile-first,
cloud-first world, and its mission is to empower every person and every organization on the planet to achieve more.
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