Watson Health Medical Imaging Collaborative Expands to 24 Members; IBM Debuts Watson Imaging Clinical Review, the First Cognitive Imaging Offering

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Feb 20, 2017, 07:00 ET

ORLANDO, Fla., Feb. 20, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- IBM (NYSE: IB M) today at HIMSS17 introduced IBM Watson Imaging Clinical Review -- the first cognitive imaging offering from Watson Health -- and announced the expansion of the Watson Health medical imaging collaborative to 24 organizations worldwide, adding clinical and industry expertise for the worldwide initiative already tackling eye, brain, breast, heart and related conditions.

The Watson Health medical imaging collaborative is an initiative comprised of leading health systems, academic medical centers, private radiology practices, ambulatory radiology providers, and imaging technology companies that are finding ways to use medical imaging to identify and predict the risk of cancer, diabetes, and diseases of the eye, brain and heart and related conditions.

New collaborative members Froedtert & the Medical College of Wisconsin, IDx LLC, PrivaCors, Strategic Radiology, Sutter Health, Pacific Radiology Group, University of Michigan and University of Virginia Health System join founding members Agfa HealthCare, Anne Arundel Medical Center, Baptist Health South Florida, Eastern Virginia Medical School, Hologic, Inc., ifa systems AG, inoveon, Radiology Associates of South Florida, Sentara Healthcare, Sheridan Healthcare, Topcon, UC San Diego Health, University of Miami Health System, University of Vermont Health Network, vRad, a MEDNAX (NYSE: MD) company and Merge, an IBM company.

"The medical imaging collaborative is vital to Watson's ongoing training and the development of cognitive imaging solutions to address the world's pressing health challenges," said Anne Le Grand, vice president of Imaging for Watson Health. "Members of the collaborative helped design and curate data for Watson Imaging Clinical Review, which we debut today at the HIMSS17 conference."

Watson Health will debut Watson Imaging Clinical Review, the first cognitive imaging offering from IBM. The first application for the offering is cardiovascular disease, starting with a common condition called aortic stenosis (AS). AS, which affects 1.5 million Americans¹, occurs when the aortic valve in the heart is narrowed, impeding blood flow to the rest of the body and causing shortness of breath, tiredness, and chest pain.

Watson Imaging Clinical Review uses cognitive text analytics to read structured and unstructured information in a cardiologist's medical report, combines that with a variety of data from other sources (e.g. the EMR problem list) to determine if the the cardiologist's diagnosis of aortic stenosis was propagated to the EMR record. Simply stated, if the cardiologist's report indicates a diagnosis of aortic stenosis, Watson Imaging Clinical Review helps verify that this diagnosis was propagated into the electronic health record into places like the patient's problem list or billing record.

"Watson Imaging Clinical Review is the type of targeted AI-driven tool that providers could put to use to help them standardize care delivered across their organization, and gradually build a critical mass of reproducible results from their patient population. In doing so, it can support a population health-driven approach to personalized care," said Nadim Michel Daher, a medical imaging and informatics analyst for Frost & Sullivan.

"Out of the gate, this type of cognitive tool may provide big benefits to hospitals and doctors, providing insights we don't currently have and doing so in a way that fits how we work," said Ricardo C. Cury, M.D., director of Cardiac Imaging at Baptist Health of South Florida and chairman and CEO of Radiology Associates of South Florida.

IBM plans to supplement the release of this offering with nine additional cardiovascular conditions, such as myocardial infarctions (heart attacks), valve disorders, cardiomyopathy (disease of the heart muscle), and deep vein thrombosis.

To learn more about Watson Imaging Clinical Review and other work by Watson Health's imaging group, visit HIMSS17 booth #1712. HIMSS17 -- the 2017 Health Information and Management Systems Society Annual Conference and Exhibition – takes place this week at the Orange County Convention Center in Orlando, Florida. Go online to learn about IBM Watson Health at HIMSS17 and follow IBM's Watson Health's social media channels #IBMHealthcare, #WatsonHealth, and #HIMSS17 for on-site activity updates, times and locations, as well as timely insights from the Watson Health ecosystem.

About IBM Watson Health
Watson is the first commercially available cognitive computing capability representing a new era in computing. The system, delivered through the cloud, analyzes high volumes of data, understands complex questions posed in natural language, and proposes evidence-based answers. Watson continuously learns, gaining in value and knowledge over time, from previous interactions. In April 2015, the company launched IBM Watson Health and the Watson Health Core cloud platform (now Watson Platform for Health). The new unit will help improve the ability of doctors, researchers and insurers to innovate by surfacing insights from the massive amount of personal health data being created and shared daily. The Watson Platform for Health can mask patient identities and allow for information to be shared and combined with a dynamic and constantly growing aggregated view of clinical, research and social health data. For more information on IBM Watson, visit: ibm.com/watson. For more information on IBM Watson Health, visit: ibm.com/watsonhealth.

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1. Bach D, Radeva J, Birnbaum H, et al. Prevalence, Referral Patterns, Testing, and Surgery in Aortic Valve Disease: Leaving Women and Elderly Patients Behind. J Heart Valve Disease. 2007:362-9.

SOURCE IBM