Medical support system

• US 8,121,862 B2
• Filed: 06/22/2010
• Issued: 02/21/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 12/12/2001
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: General Electric Company
• Original Assignee: General Electric Company
• Inventors: Janas, John J. III, Thompson, John Robert, Lustig, Michael Robert
• Primary Examiner(s): RANGREJ, SHEETAL
• Application Number:
  US12/820,916
• Publication Number:
  US 20110015937A1
• Time in Patent Office: 609 Days
• Field of Search: 705 2- 3
• US Class Current: 705/2
• CPC Class Codes: G16H 40/20 for the management or administration of healthcare resources or facilities, e.g. managing hospital staff or surgery rooms
• CPC Class Codes: G16H 50/20 for computer-aided diagnosis, e.g. based on medical expert systems
• CPC Class Codes: G16H 70/20 relating to practices or guidelines

Abstract

A medical support system and method for performing at least one medical support process relating to diagnosis and treatment of a medical condition and that includes or employs medical records relating to patients and medical support databases including medical guidelines for the diagnosis and treatment of a medical condition. A medical support process includes one or more process phases, which may include a data phase, a diagnostic phase and a therapy/treatment recommendation phase. Each process phase includes one or more process operations wherein each of the process operations of a process phase includes one or more process forms providing interfaces between a user and the process operations. Each process form includes fields for passing user inputs to the process operations and for displaying the results of the process operations to the user and the support processes are responsive to user inputs, the medical records and the guidelines to execute an interactive dialogue between the medical support process and the user to provide guidance to the user in performing the medical support process according to the guidelines and dependent upon the user inputs and the medical record.

Claims

1. A medical support system including:

a processor connected to a memory, wherein the processor is programmed to implement the system comprising;

a medical support process to access a plurality of data sources to retrieve a patient'"'"'s medical record and medical guidelines for diagnosis and treatment of medical conditions according to medical professional guidelines, the medical support process to utilize data from the patient'"'"'s medical record and medical guidelines to identify a recommendation of at least one of a diagnosis and a treatment for the patient in support of a medical practitioner user;

an interactive dialogue between the medical support process and the user to provide guidance to the user, based on the identified recommendation, in performing the medical support process according to the guidelines and dependent upon user input, the patient'"'"'s medical record, and the medical guidelines, wherein the guidance provided to the user can be overridden by the user, and wherein the interactive dialogue requests input from the user upon user override of the guidance, the requested input including a reason for the user'"'"'s override of the guidance; and

a bi-directional dialect translator to receive and translate between preferred dialect medical terms entered by a user and corresponding equivalent but different standard medical terms employed in the medical support process operation and, conversely, to bi-directionally translate the standard medical terms employed by the medical process support operation into the preferred dialect medical terms originally entered and used by the user for display to the user.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein the medical support process includes:

at least one process form to provide an interface between the user and process operations, each process form including fields passing user input to the process operations and displaying the results of the process operations to the user; and

at least one support process responsive to user input, patient medical record data, and guidelines to perform the process operations, wherein the at least support process is to execute an interactive dialogue between the medical support process and the user to provide guidance to the user in performing the medical support process according to the guidelines and dependent upon the user inputs and the medical record.

3. The system of claim 2, further comprising an input device to receive user input relating to the medical support process;

and

an output device to display the results of the medical support process to a user.

4. The system of claim 2, wherein a medical support process includes:

a data phase to enter new information and reviewing historical information pertaining to the medical condition of the patient for the purposes of the medical support process; and

an assessment phase to evaluate the patient'"'"'s present medical condition based upon the information from the data phase and the guidelines for the diagnosis and treatment of the medical condition.

5. The system of claim 4, wherein a medical support process further includes:

a recommendations phase including process operations and guidelines to assist the user in determining a course of treatment for the patient.

6. The system of claim 1, wherein the guidelines are to be dynamically updated with a patient based guideline for the individual patient based on user input and the patient'"'"'s medical record.

7. The system of claim 1, wherein user input used to override the guidance is entered in the patient'"'"'s medical record.

8. A computer-implemented method to provide support for a medical practitioner performing at least one of diagnosis and treatment of a patient'"'"'s medical condition, the method comprising:

accessing a plurality of data sources, using a processor, to retrieve a patient'"'"'s medical record and medical guidelines for diagnosis and treatment of medical conditions according to medical professional guidelines;

automatically identifying, using the processor, a recommendation of at least one of a diagnosis and a treatment for the patient, utilizing data from the patient'"'"'s medical record and medical guidelines, in support of the medical practitioner;

providing, using the processor, an interactive dialogue between the medical support process and the medical practitioner to provide guidance to the medical practitioner, based on the identified recommendation, in performing the medical support process according to the guidelines and dependent upon input from the medical practitioner, the patient'"'"'s medical record, and the medical guidelines;

receiving and translating, using a bi-directional dialect translator, between preferred dialect medical terms entered by the medical practitioner and corresponding equivalent but different standard medical terms employed in the plurality of data sources, and, conversely, bi-directionally translating the standard medical terms employed by the plurality of data sources into the preferred dialect medical terms originally entered and used by the medical practitioner for display to the medical practitioner;

accepting an override of the guidance provided to the medical practitioner;

requesting, via the interactive dialogue, input from the medical practitioner upon an override of the guidance by the medical practitioner, the requested input including a reason for the override of the guidance.

9. The method of claim 8, further comprising dynamically updating the guidelines with a patient based guideline for the individual patient based on medical practitioner input and the patient'"'"'s medical record.

10. The method of claim 8, further comprising entering the medical practitioner'"'"'s input used to override the guidance into the patient'"'"'s medical record.

11. A tangible computer-readable storage medium having a set of instructions stored thereon which, when executed, instruct a processor to implement a method to provide support for a medical practitioner performing at least one of diagnosis and treatment of a patient'"'"'s medical condition, the method comprising:

accessing a plurality of data sources to retrieve a patient'"'"'s medical record and medical guidelines for diagnosis and treatment of medical conditions according to medical professional guidelines;

automatically identifying a recommendation of at least one of a diagnosis and a treatment for the patient, utilizing data from the patient'"'"'s medical record and medical guidelines, in support of the medical practitioner;

providing an interactive dialogue between the medical support process and the medical practitioner to provide guidance to the medical practitioner, based on the identified recommendation, in performing the medical support process according to the guidelines and dependent upon input from the medical practitioner, the patient'"'"'s medical record, and the medical guidelines;

receiving and translating, using a bi-directional dialect translator, between preferred dialect medical terms entered by the medical practitioner and corresponding equivalent but different standard medical terms employed in the plurality of data sources, and, conversely, bi-directionally translating the standard medical terms employed by the plurality of data sources into the preferred dialect medical terms originally entered and used by the medical practitioner for display to the medical practitioner;

accepting an override of the guidance provided to the medical practitioner;

requesting, via the interactive dialogue, input from the medical practitioner upon an override of the guidance by the medical practitioner, the requested input including a reason for the override of the guidance.

12. The computer-readable medium of claim 11, wherein the method further comprises dynamically updating the guidelines with a patient based guideline for the individual patient based on medical practitioner input and the patient'"'"'s medical record.

13. The computer-readable medium of claim 11, wherein the method further comprises entering the medical practitioner'"'"'s input used to override the guidance into the patient'"'"'s medical record.

14. The computer-readable medium of claim 11, wherein automatically identifying further comprises identifying a recommendation based at least in part on an interplay of factors, recommendations, guidelines, and requirements from the plurality of data sources.

15. The computer-readable medium of claim 11, further comprising providing prompts and reminders regarding 1) information, 2) test, 4) guideline for at least one of diagnosis and treatment, 5) decision support, 6) therapeutic recommendations, 7) educational information, and 8) capture of metrics during a patient encounter with the medical practitioner.

16. The computer-readable medium of claim 11, wherein identifying a recommendation and providing an interactive dialogue comprises a plurality of process phases including a data entry and review phase, a diagnostic phase and a therapeutic/treatment recommendations phase, wherein each phase is to be presented to the medical practitioner through process forms providing graphic interfaces for the entry and display of information regarding the support process.

17. The computer-readable medium of claim 11, wherein said requesting further comprises providing the medical practitioner with a plurality of fields to enter the reasons for disagreement with the guidelines upon an override of a reminder, suggestion, or prompt, wherein the reasons are to be automatically entered in the patient'"'"'s medical record as a reminder to the medical practitioner.