Intel unveils mobile clinical assistant platform

Intel took the wraps off some of its latest handiwork yesterday, showing off plans for a new mobile computing platform for healthcare professionals at its Developers Forum in San Francisco. The platform, dubbed the mobile clinical assistant, is designed to streamline the work-flow of doctors and nurses, letting them digitally record patient's vital signs, progress charts, and prescription information on specially-designed tablet PCs, and wirelessly transfer that information to pharmacists or anyone else that needs to check up on your vitals. Anything in the way of specific details are still pretty vague at the moment, but the first devices based on the platform are set to be developed by Motion Computing and introduced in the first half of 2007. Among the possibilities for the devices are RFID-scanning to identify patients (better pack that tinfoil hat for your next hospital visit), barcode scanning for prescriptions, and integrated digital cameras. We're all for improving healthcare through technology but, to be honest, we'd kinda like to have a couple of these around Engadget HQ for ourselves -- especially given the spill-proof, drop-tolerant casing.

[Via Geekzone]

[Stu L Tissimus @ Sep 28th 2006 7:07PM]

Welp, that screen doesn't look photoshopped at all, nosiree. Is that seriously part of the press materials, or is it just something you guys found on google image?

[kettch @ Sep 28th 2006 7:13PM]

While these kinds of devices are pretty cool, some hospitals will be slow to adopt them. On hospital system that I worked for didn't even want to give the staff laptops to carry from room to room. The reason was that they got stolen by staff, patients, visitors, everybody.

I suppose that if this was a UMPC design that was crippled to the point of being useless to anybody outside the hospital, then that would help some. However, that would probably come at the cost of being flexible enough to run any hospital specific applications.

[RogueAce @ Sep 28th 2006 7:16PM]

Hmm, I bet this will open up some controversy when someone gets their hands on it and tries to hack it. It seems like a great idea, but i hope intel has their bases covered for this kind of thing.

[Matt Hall @ Sep 28th 2006 7:46PM]

I do not think that this will be that good of an idea. For starters, there are already monited beds and such. And, they look liike they would be extremely easy to steal, unless they have some sort of RFID chip to keep track of them.

What if a narcotic-addicted patient's nurse or doctor accidently left it by his bedside, couldn't he order more information for himself, providing that he knows how to falislfy a doctor's signiture?

[Ellipsis @ Sep 28th 2006 8:22PM]

What's so great about a product like this is it is just a XP tablet underneath, so consumers, if they can get their hands on em too, can totally disregard the medical software. The features and form factor that make it so handy in a hospital--bluetooth, 802.11, rfid and barcode scanners, camera, lightweight, in a "drop tolerant" and spill proof enclosure with a handle that you can wipe down--make up a tablet that's pretty kick-ass on its own merits. I wouldn't mind having one....

[gabehoffman @ Sep 28th 2006 8:26PM]

having worked on some things like this with doctors, they are not open to change, this thing will have to really be flawless to gain acceptance.

[Michael VH Chong @ Sep 28th 2006 8:27PM]

Yet another idea from Star Trek becoming reality! Sorry I'm a Trekkie

[Eric D. @ Sep 28th 2006 8:33PM]

Reminds me of the little tablets they use on Eureka.

[Bryan @ Sep 28th 2006 8:37PM]

I am an exclusive reseller for Motion Computing in my area and own an IT consulting business. We deal a lot with medical facilities and have been testing these out over the past couple of weeks. Motion's tablets are top notch and have always performed well in the medical industry. These units are great little workhorses and do a great job. I would highly recommend taking a look at them when they are released to the public. Bryan.

[Michael Rajendran @ Sep 28th 2006 11:55PM]

Hi Bryan, where do you have your consulting business? i live in NY, westchester area and had a Medical Manager dealership, had about 150 clients, and am looking for the next great thing in this field. Would like to know more about what you do. Hopefully hear from you soon, thanks

[Terry @ Sep 29th 2006 2:37AM]

Bryan, I have clients in the medical field as well and would be interested in finding a supplier of theses devices. I'd be interested in learning more about the device as well as possible release dates.

[Rudy @ Sep 28th 2006 9:53PM]

Finally! Something for EDC (Electronic Data Capture) for pharmaceutical clinical studies.

[Adam @ Sep 28th 2006 10:27PM]

I work at a hospital in the medical records department. I would love it if every hospital adopted these things, even though it would mean my job as well as most of my department would be cut.

You have to see it to beleive the amount of waste in our department. I'm counting down to the day our hospital adopts fully digital records and we all get laid off.

[Nick @ Sep 28th 2006 11:35PM]

Intel laid this out to us a few months back at my hospital. I'm a lead architect in their IT department. Sure, it looks nice and is quite pretty and could potentially be cool.

For those above who are saying "we need one" - unfortunately the adoption of this only works if you're at a stage where your online clinical documentation supports devices like this. Cerner Millennium does not, for instances.

Tablets still have niche applications and are a good tool to have, but you need to give the physician a device that would make their lives easier.

Unfortunately, laptops disappear from hospitals like nothing, so it's logical that people are skeptical about handing them out when a decent number of them are going to walk. Let's face it - no one would want to take responsibility for it.

Bryan is right. Motion Computing makes really awesome slate tablets already. This does look cute, but it's not going to sell millions like Intel is thinking it will.

[elliot @ Sep 28th 2006 11:46PM]

Interesting. At my hospital, we use laptops. They are attached to small portable workstation on wheels, almost as a small desk, thus making them damn near unstealable.

We use Cerner Millenium, and I am able to download patient information onto my PDA via Millenium Mobile, a sister program of Cerner Millenium for portable devices.

All that to say, that this could definitely be usable, but as the preivous comments can attest, the easily stolen factor would be an issue.

[Mike @ Sep 29th 2006 5:35AM]

I totally agree that these should be implemented in hospitals across the country. Not only will it save on wasteful paper use, no one has to worry about people's handwritings whether it is the doctor's or nurse's.

Yes, what was science fiction before is quickly becoming a reality.

kobiata.blogspot.com
myspace.com/kobiata

[Korsakow @ Sep 29th 2006 6:52AM]

Tablets, UMPCs, PDAs, Laptops, whatever... IMHO the real challenge in this market is creating reliable, usable software which binds into existing clinical workflows. Until those requirements are met, new technology (even if it includes RFID, cameras, Bluetooth, EVDO...) just makes most clinicians' lives more miserable and doesn't significantly improve patient care or help reduce costs.

[Zeus @ Sep 29th 2006 6:07PM]

Getting wireless to work in a hospital environment is a nightmare. I work in the IT headquarters for a large HMO and we are rolling out digital records to most hospitals. (At great expense) But due to chronic problems with connectivity with wireless in our field evaluations the current solution consists of putting a thin client workstation in each doctor's examination room. (Which has been working great)

It hasn't been rolled out as much in hospitals yet, although in a recent new test attempting to use the aforementioned wireless laptop carts things (again, wireless in hospitals = hell on earth) went horribly.

The problem is that the system is beautiful and the doctors and nurses love it... when it works. So when it breaks it just pisses them off twice as much because they can see the potential but are frustrated by messages on the systems saying that it can't reach the servers. (Imagine giving a hardcore gamer a PS3 before anyone else has one... that also happens to reset every 5min.)

Among the issues that were found:
- Probably due to heightened building codes (fire, earthquake, etc [so I've been told, not my department]) in hospitals, the wireless signal is attenuated from the APs to such a point that 2-3x AP density appears to be required.

-Hospital sterilizers, cafeteria industrial microwaves, and staff breakroom microwaves operate on the same frequency potentially causing outages each time something is cooked. (Not joking, we discovered most of the microwaves 'leaked' when troubleshooting with spectrum analyzers) This was bringing down entire -floors- of hospital wireless.

I have also been told (but this isn't my department so I don't know) that when firmware on approved medical devices has to be updated it has to be resubmitted to testing and approval by whatever the governing agency happens to be. (FDA I guess?)

[Zeus @ Sep 29th 2006 6:11PM]

Thin *wired client that is.

Also, the FDA reapproval on the patching was implicitly too broad. Every desktop wouldn't need to be reapproved every time a new Service Pack came out, but rather certain applications or devices that work in concert with the mobile workstations.

[Matt Hall @ Sep 29th 2006 6:24PM]

One more problem with using them in an ICU would be that if a patient is in isolation, the tablet would probably have to be thrown away afterwards, depending on what the patient was afflicted with.

[Zeus @ Sep 29th 2006 8:39PM]

Not sure about the ICU thing but I do know that certain building inspectors made us replace some AP antena casings (mounted on walls high up near the tile ceilings)because they were covered in cloth and thus 'could trap microbes' and contaminate the hospital. That seems to vary by the inspector though.

[ug @ Oct 1st 2006 12:55AM]

If it's "drop"-tolerant then it shouldn't have a problem reading "drop"-heavy Engadget posts.

[Tyler @ Mar 31st 2007 1:15PM]

"While many sophisticated medical machines exist for diagnostic procedures and surgeries, technology has not much entered the routine doctor-patient, nurse-patient and office record keeping realms of medicine."


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