Alabama firm plans all-digital hospital

HealthSouth says its new hospital will reduce the likelihood of errors and give doctors more time to spend with patients.

By Cheryl Jackson, AMNews staff. April 16, 2001.

HealthSouth Corp. and software giant Oracle Corp. are planning to build a so-called "digital hospital" in HealthSouth's home town of Birmingham, Ala. What is now done with paper charts and pens in other hospitals will be done with computers, even at bedside, at the proposed 219-bed facility.

And if physicians want to treat patients there, they'd best be tech-savvy, or at least in line to get online. They'll need handheld computers and more training to keep up with patients the way hospital leaders want them to -- at any time, from anywhere, without paper.

Promoted as the first of its kind to implement such wide use of technology, the facility will include centralized electronic storage for medical records and a wireless network for medical personnel to update patient information.

Doctors and nurses would use computers at patients' beds to enter data and access the Internet.

"This will be the hospital model for the world," said Richard Scrushy, HealthSouth chair and chief executive. "We will demonstrate how technology can lower health care costs, greatly reduce human errors and provide patients with the best medical care available."

Birmingham-area doctors say they like the idea of a digital hospital if the technology is simple to use.

"The technology has to get simpler and better. Even with a Palm Pilot now, trying to walk around and get information is cumbersome," said pediatrician Carden Johnston, MD. "I imagine having a whole system set up in a hospital will make it easier. But if it's not easy, not informative and not confidential, it won't work." [...]