A TEAM of Country Health SA clinicians and South Australian information technology experts have won a Federal Government grant to develop an Australian-first artificial intelligence digital health platform that ultimately aims to keep people out of hospital.
A consortium led by Country Health SA’s Integrated Cardiovascular Clinical Network (iCCnet) was awarded a $340,000 grant to develop an AI platform that collates clinical data and automatically assesses peoples’ health risk – whether presenting to hospital or at home.
iCCnet clinical director Phil Tideman said for the past decade the team had been working on developing a number of clinical databases that collect data real time, including blood test and ECG results.
“What we’re trying to do now is apply sophisticated IT techniques to bring data together, which will enable us to make better clinical decisions,” Dr Tideman said.
“By bringing the data together in a cloud-based platform, we can continuously monitor patients’ health risk while they are at home or in the emergency department.
“IT applications that automatically monitor the data will aim to highlight those who need early intervention, allowing our doctors and specialists to act before a health issue becomes more serious, aiming to keep people out of hospital where possible.”
Country Health SA chief executive Maree Geraghty congratulated the iCCnet team on the outstanding success.
“This is a fantastic acknowledgment of the groundbreaking work being done by the team which will improve patient outcomes for people initially in rural and regional SA and then eventually around the country and potentially the globe,” Ms Geraghty said.
“The sustainability of the health care system relies on improving patients’ ability to safely manage their conditions in the community and this requires smart technology.
“I look forward to hearing about the great results this digital health platform will bring to patients.”
