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BASIICS
(Biothreat
Active Surveillance Integrated Information and communication
System)
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Stanford Hospital Pilots Cutting Edge Bioterrorism and Public
Health Surveillance Technology
October 30 2001 -- Health
Hero Network, Inc. has announced that Stanford Hospital will
be among the first in the nation to pilot BASIICS, a cutting-edge
public health surveillance technology developed by Health Hero Network.
BASIICS stands for Biothreat Active Surveillance Integrated Information
and Communication System. This new technology will enable public
health agencies to monitor in real time selected signs and symptoms
reported by patients coming into the Emergency Department and to
look for syndromes or patterns of symptoms that could indicate a
bioterrorist attack. BASIICS also can be used to track influenza,
diarrhea, and other infectious disease outbreaks in a population.
"Emergency Department personnel are likely to be the first
to encounter unusual patterns of illnesses that could result from
bioterrorism, but many of the initial symptoms are non-specific,
such as fever and rash," said Eric L. Weiss, MD, Emergency
Medicine and Infectious Diseases at Stanford. "Public health
departments have instituted syndromic surveillance programs to look
for unusual patterns of symptoms, but until now these programs have
been low-tech, slow to detect outbreaks, and have required significant
staff time and paperwork. BASIICS is exciting because it provides
both real-time patient monitoring on the front lines of our healthcare
system and is also extremely simple and cost-effective." Dr.
Eric Weiss added, "We can't ensure disease outbreaks will never
happen, but just that they're caught right away."
Mountain View, Calif. based Heath Hero Network designed BASIICS
based on its patented and proven remote health monitoring technology
platform, recently awarded "Best Telehealth Technology"
by the Health Industry Management Systems Society for its use in
remote patient monitoring and disease management. The Health Hero®
technology consists of Health Buddy®, a simple and convenient
four-button survey device that plugs into a standard phone line,
and web-based applications for programming new questions and for
analyzing the resulting data. When used for syndromic surveillance,
hospital nurses simply press buttons to respond to a series questions
about patient symptoms displayed on the Health Buddy screen. The
data is transmitted via a phone line to an offsite secure data center.
Doctors, researchers, or government agencies can then aggregate
and analyze data in real-time using a standard Internet web-browser.
"Health Hero Network is providing tools that will enable our
public health officers and epidemiologists to constantly survey
the medical front lines and be able to statistically analyze that
data in real-time," said Steve Brown, CEO of Health Hero Network.
"Stanford is leading the way in helping to prove this new model
for active and dynamic disease surveillance that will make our country
safer and improve our public health."
About Health Hero Network:
Health Hero Network, Inc., based in Mountain View, California, develops
and markets the industry leading technology platform for remote
patient communications, monitoring, care management. The Health
Hero platform includes Health Buddy®, a simple and convenient
appliance used for data collection and communications about patient
symptoms and behavior without placing a burden on either patients
or healthcare providers. The solution also includes a secure data
center and web-based applications that enable healthcare professionals
to analyze the resulting data. The platform is currently being used
for over a dozen major medical conditions. As a pioneer in health
monitoring technology for over 10 years, Health Hero Network has
been awarded over 45 patents on its innovative technology. Health
Hero Network licenses its platform to medical technology and services
companies seeking a technology blueprint proven to enable better
care at lower cost.
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