Oracle Corp. to help build world's first "Digital Hospital"

Oracle Corp. and Health South Corp. together will build the worlds first "all digital hospital", according to a release on Monday, issued by the out patient surgical rehabilitation chain. The digital hospital will feature inpatient beds with display screens connected to the Internet, electronic medical records storage, digital imaging and a wireless communications network permitting doctors and other caregivers to access patient's medical records from anywhere, inside or outside the hospital.

The hospital will come up at Birmingham, Alabama and will cost around 120 to 125 million U.S. dollars. The project will be fast tracked and hopefully completed by 2003. From the moment a patient registers at the hospital, every blood test and MRI will be recorded in a central patient record, and pharmacy visits will be tracked. All charting will be done at the patient's bedside, "getting the nurses' back to the patient's side" and making doctors more efficient. Oracle will provide the technology that will allow Health South to improve record-keeping and patient care, officials of the two companies said in a briefing on Monday. Ultimately, they said, the improvements will reduce the overall cost of care. It was also added at the briefing that another 10 sites where the hospital can be duplicated have been identified. Its now the era of cyber hospitals!!!