Mount Sinai Hospital’s VitalHub, the Latest in iPhone + EMR «

March 26, 2010
Posted by Elizabeth Han

Mount Sinai Hospital’s VitalHub, the Latest in iPhone + EMR

Just wanted to post about VitalHub, the latest in iPhone + EMR — being developed and implemented in-house at Mount Sinai Hospital in Toronto!

Watch the beautiful video of it in action, courtesy of the Apple website.

The essentials:

VitalHub allows health care professionals to access records from 66 applications being used at Mount Sinai Hospital, including those storing clinical data, reference materials, and patient information.

“We now have access to exactly what we have in our computers here in the hospital. We can get access to our patients’ data whenever and wherever we want it. Knowing what’s happening with their drugs, radiology, laboratory values, microbiology results — it really enables me to make decisions on the go.”

Access from anywhere.

“Whether using Wi-Fi or 3G on iPhone, doctors can access VitalHub no matter where they are,” explains Dwivedi. “They can review a patient chart before they come into the hospital, whether they are at home, in a restaurant, or at an airport.”

Security is provided by password and VPN certificates.

FYI, Sinai is one of several large hospitals located just down the street from U of T/MaRS/Center for Global eHealth Innovations (and also where I did my honors thesis!) so I think this is very exciting for the downtown Toronto eHealth conversation!

Yesterday, I was reading on Hans Oh’s blog that eHealth seems to be becoming “mainstream” — in that it’s cool to be devoting time, effort, and research monies towards it, there are articles on NEJM about it – and it seems that VitalHub, which is very openly promoted by the hospital, is an example of that happening in Canada. I am glad to see that people are really noticing what Dr. David Kibbe said: that actually many physicians have been happy to adopt the iPhone, but such a small percentage have adoped EMRs. It might just be that we have been waiting for innovations like this, piggybacking on technologies that are already accepted by health care workers.

We’ll keep an eye on the official website, Apple’s site, and the Baron Group blog for further information in the coming months.

Torontonians (and others), what do you think?

2 Comments

Posted Under Canada Design & Usability Electronic Medical Records Toronto

Dr. med. Axel J. Müller

This really is a great report and absolutely inspiring. In “good old Europe” as per my knowledge some hospitals are just thinking about or starting up similar activities with the iPhone or other SmartPhones. I yet haven't seen such mature implementation over here. I will follow it up in my professional life and aim at boosting that type of transparent hitting the spot eHealth-support for medical staff. Thx a lot for that post.

http://www.hospitalsongs.com/ Elizabeth Han

I think it's inspiring too! I just had a lecture yesterday from our University Health Network saying lamenting that Canada is 10 yrs behind the US on getting innovations out to the public. I'm glad to see this great initiative and that it's already in the hands of Mount Sinai's doctors making a difference. Thanks, Dr. Müller!