Published on the 05/10/2016 | Written by Newsdesk
Orion Health does some show and tell on the drive to precision medicine…
The folk at Orion Health have been busy following the announcement of its intention to put machine learning to work in its products within a year. It has just released a report, in conjunction with the University of Auckland, which makes clearer how that will work.
The Introduction to Machine Learning in Healthcare report is co-authored by Dr Kevin Ross and Dr Kathryn Hemstalk, with an introduction by Orion Health CEO Ian McCrae.
Among other things, the report lifts the lid on data that is useful for the practice of precision medicine, and which will become part of an electronic health record and provides an introduction to different types of machine learning models.
The report’s publication coincides with the official launch of Precision Driven Health at the University of Auckland, which the company described in a statement as ‘one of the largest data science research initiatives to be undertaken in this country’.
“The electronic health record is fast becoming the most powerful tool in the medical toolkit. Today it contains a patient’s medical record, soon it will include genetic, environmental and social data and will be critical in the application of precision medicine or personalised healthcare,” said McCrae.
He said healthcare workers will be unable to process this information in a timely way and will rely on high-powered computing, using insights from machine learning. “Algorithms will interrogate vast data sets and present recommended treatment plans tailored to individuals,” McCrae said.
“Essential to the application of machine learning are intelligent algorithms and rich data sets. We have invested in the Precision Driven Health initiative, and our software manages over 100 million patient records globally, making us one of the few health software companies in the world capable of carrying out machine learning analysis at scale.”
As a founding partner in the Precision Driven Health initiative, Waitemata District Health Board is implementing health informatics and analytics capabilities to deliver healthcare for Auckland’s North and West. The DHB’s CE Dr Dale Bramley said the joint initiative with Orion Health and the University of Auckland promotes a better understanding of its patient population and will result in an improved suite of decision-support tools for healthcare professionals, that should lead to better health outcomes.
“Knowledge-driven healthcare supports our clinicians to make sound clinical decisions at the frontline of our hospitals and communities. It enables streamlined, personalised care and ultimately results in better care plans, outcomes and experiences for our patients,” Bramley said.
