It appears that IBM will joining with an EMR entity to join their Watson diagnostic capabilities to the EMR.
As Becker's reports:
Epic plans to embed Waton's cognitive computing capabilities into its
EHR using open standards, which will then allow patient data to be
pulled from health records and delivered to Watson. The supercomputer
will then analyze that data in comparison to its massive volumes of
stored clinical data and produce medical literature and case studies
most relevant to that patient's care to help inform clinical decisions
in real time.
Now just think if you are a physician using this system and it "suggests" an alternative diagnosis or procedure and you over-ride it, then through discovery you may be found negligent, or IBM is brought into a claim for practicing without a license.
This is one of those nice ideas that sounded good when they first thought through it. It may not sound so great after a few trials.
One wonders if this is Press Release driven. Imagine suing the HAL 9000 or it cousin!