Dr. John Brownstein, chief innovation officer at Boston Children’s Hospital, which uses one the the new healthcare features, says that: “From our view, [Alexa’s data protection] makes for great opportunity in healthcare, because what we’re trying to do is make it easier for patients to access information, easier for patients to track their health and easier for patients to interact with their healthcare system”.
Read MoreAmazon, which launched the program on Thursday, said the skills are all compliant with the federal Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, which ensures that personal health care information is protected.
Read More“Our view is we’re trying to make things as simple for our patients as possible and bridge the gap with how people engage with us in the hospital, but also at home,” John Brownstein, chief innovation officer at Boston Children’s Hospital, said in an interview. “As these technologies become natural and easy to engage with, it's a great opportunity for us to utilize them to provide to the best possible patient experience.”
Read MoreBoston Children’s Hospital is also using the device to allow parents to give its care teams updates on a sick child’s recovery and allow patients to schedule appointments. Livongo, a digital health company specialising in chronic conditions, will integrate Alexa with the rest of their devices, allowing members to query their blood sugar readings and receive personalised “health nudges” on the device.
Read MoreAmazon today announced a limited number of voice apps for the Alexa Skills Kit by health care companies like Cigna and Boston Children’s Hospital that operate in compliance with the U.S. Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA).
Read MoreAmazon unveiled software on Thursday that allows health care companies to build Alexa voice tools capable of securely transmitting private patient information, a move that opens the door to a broad array of uses in homes and hospitals.
Read MoreIn a statement to WIRED, Amazon said that while the company applies multiple layers of security to all skill data—including encryption, access controls, and secure storage in the Amazon cloud—the health care skills data will be treated differently to meet HIPAA requirements. The company did not specify what additional measures are in place to ensure that users’ personal health information is properly identified and access to it is controlled and properly audited.
Read MoreNow, Boston Children’s has a new HIPAA-compliant skill dubbed “ERAS” for kids and their families that are discharged from the hospital. Through Alexa’s voice assistant, patients and caregivers can ask specific questions about their case from the care team, and doctors can remotely check in on the child’s recovery process.
Read MoreThe announcement is Amazon’s latest effort in making inroads into the nation’s $3.5 trillion health care market.
Read More“Boston Children’s Hospital has long believed that voice technology has the potential to substantially improve the healthcare experience for both consumers and clinicians. We began this journey with one of the first Amazon Alexa skills from a hospital four years ago and are thrilled to participate in the initial launch of Amazon Alexa’s HIPAA-eligible service for developers,” said John Brownstein, chief innovation officer, Boston Children’s Hospital, in a statement.
Read MoreBack in 2018, Amazon announced it was teaming up with JPMorgan and Berkshire Hathaway to create technological solutions to improve healthcare. Turns out it just needed to ask Alexa.
Today, the company announced six new HIPAA-compliant Alexa skills are available to help patients and caregivers alike. The new skills come courtesy of healthcare companies like Cigna and Boston Children’s Hospital that operate in compliance with HIPAA, or the U.S. Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996.
Read MoreDeveloped by providers, payers and other stakeholders, each of the new voice-based services is designed to conveniently bring health knowledge and management into the home.
My Children’s Enhanced Recovery After Surgery (ERAS): Boston Children’s Hospital’s newest voice technology tool helps parents understand and follow pre- and post-surgery guidance, as well as to understand their child’s recovery progress and manage upcoming appointments. The skill is currently being implemented at the hospital for patients receiving cardiac surgeries, although Boston Children’s said that it is hoping to expand the skill to include additional patient groups “in the near future.”
Read MoreAmazon’s Alexa voice assistant has a new trick: transmitting secure patient information between patients and caregivers. Developers can now use the Alexa Skills Kit to build HIPAA-compliant apps, opening the door for hospitals, insurers, digital health startups and others to manage patient data through voice.
Read MoreAmazon has invited six health care companies to build tools using Alexa
Read MoreAmazon on Thursday said it had added healthcare skills to its Alexa voice assistant.
Read MoreThe My Children’s ERAS Skill will first be made available to parents and caregivers of children that have undergone cardiac surgery. It allows parents and caregivers to conduct digital check-ins through Alexa, providing care teams with updates on their child’s recovery progress, including activity level, appetite, and pain management. Parents and caregivers can also use the skill to access information regarding the child’s upcoming post-op appointments.
Read MoreSince implementing a suite of Nuance voice recognition tools, the health system has seen a 23 percent reduction in transcription costs and 71 percent of users reporting that the quality of their documentation has improved significantly.
Read MoreThe Cuff to Cloud experience will instantly and effortlessly upload readings to the company’s database, which will then deliver a real-time and personalized message to its members.
Read MoreThe pilot program with Sutter will introduce the Redwood City-based company’s technology across three specialties: primary care, dermatology and orthopedics. Suki’s technology – which is accessible through a mobile app or a web portal – uses voice commands from physicians to create written clinical notes or orders which are then recorded onto the EHR.
Read MoreJohn Brownstein, chief innovation officer at Boston Children’s Hospital, is bullish on the prospect of voice as a game changer in healthcare. “Healthcare is at a tipping point with voice,” Brownstein said in an interview with Healthcare IT News. “We haven’t seen it transform any industries. Healthcare could be a leading vertical in voice apps.”
Other leaders in innovation are less optimistic about how successful the first applications of voice will be. Sara Holoubek, CEO of Luminary Labs, remarked that “2019 will be the year of bad voice tech experiences,” at the Boston Children’s Voice. Health Summit. Of course, very few technological advancements are perfect right from the beginning, so even if 2019 is the year of voice tech failures, 2020 may be the year of successes.
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