Creates Cross-Industry Team to Address Crisis and Save Lives
April 14, 2020 - EvidenceCare, a leading provider of advanced clinical decision support technology, announced the release of a free Web solution to help clinicians in the trenches diagnose and treat COVID-19. The system will be available beginning today, Thursday, April 9, to hospital systems, emergency room providers, urgent care companies and telehealth providers actively interfacing with patients globally.
In response to the coronavirus pandemic, EvidenceCare has taken the lead on gathering a consortium of healthcare industry experts from leading health systems, evidence-based content vendors, medical societies and industry organizations to rapidly deliver effective COVID-19 clinical pathways. The delivery mechanism will be a free, simpler version of the EHR-integrated EvidenceCare clinical decision support system (CDSS) traditionally deployed.
The solution will support COVID-19 clinical care in conjunction with any EHR by delivering current, evidence-based pathways to caregivers around the world facing the onslaught of COVID-19.
Working with EBSCO/DynaMed, EB Medicine, the American College of Emergency Physicians (ACEP), multiple hospital systems and other healthcare industry giants, EvidenceCare curated several pathways, turning massive amounts of information into digitized, consumable and interactive pathways. These pathways help streamline the provider's workflow by collating clinical documentation with each interaction and delivering the most current diagnosis and relevant treatment information available based on the patient's presenting symptoms, severity and comorbidity.
Dr. Brian Fengler, chief executive officer and co-founder of EvidenceCare, commented, "I'm proud to be part of a true team effort to address this global crisis. Clinical evidence for COVID-19 is changing daily. Our team took on the laborious, but pragmatic, approach of pulling everything together and distilled that evidence down for each clinical area, taking into consideration the strength of each source. We wanted to do the hard work for clinicians so they could find the answers they need as quickly as possible."
The pathways will be updated in near real-time within the EvidenceCare CDSS as new information about the virus is discovered, a process made easier by the number of credible partners involved. One of the first to get on board with the project was Dr. Brian S. Alper, founder of DynaMed and chief medical knowledge officer for EBSCO Information Services, who, like Fengler, was wanting to make a difference in this crisis.
"When EvidenceCare approached us about being a part of this partnership, we knew immediately it was imperative to be involved," Alper said. "Pandemics cannot be fought alone. It will take everyone across the world doing their part to come together to find a solution to COVID-19. That's what makes this project so powerful; we're bringing some of the industry's best organizations with the best evidence and information together."
By combining the best content from some of the most respected organizations in healthcare, EvidenceCare hopes that the pathways will be seen as a resource that clinicians can trust and rely on. EB Medicine's chief executive officer, Stephanie Williford, said the project aligns directly with her company's values.
"One of our goals as an organization is to provide clinicians with greater access to quality, evidence-based content," Williford said. "The EvidenceCare platform offers the velocity that we hope will make a big difference quickly as we all work feverishly to slow the spread of COVID-19."
ACEP is also participating in this effort. Dr. Vidor E. Friedman, the immediate past president of ACEP, said the pathways and platform will be especially important for emergency physicians during the pandemic as they represent the front door of the hospital.
"The speed with which clinicians in an emergency medicine environment have to work in general, let alone during a pandemic, requires technology like this," Friedman said. "Having the information readily available in such a digestible format is vital in helping physicians diagnose, treat and understand this virus better."
Information about the pathways is available for all healthcare professionals at evidence.care/covid-19, and direct access to the pathways is available at covid19.evidence.care. The pathways will be accessible for the foreseeable future.