Jerry Zeidenberg

4 weeks ago | canhealth.com | Jerry Zeidenberg

DiagnosticsBy Jerry ZeidenbergMarch 31, 2025Unfortunately, mistakes happen in medicine & up to 100,000 deaths occur annually in the United States due to medical errors, according to studies, and a proportionate number happen in Canada, as well. While medication errors and misdiagnosis are major root causes, the top cause of preventable errors are communication breakdowns.

4 weeks ago | canhealth.com | Jerry Zeidenberg

HAMILTON, ONT. – A team at Hamilton Health Sciences is leading the charge to devise a ‘universal translator’, a set of technologies that will allow the electronic records used by hospitals, doctors’ offices and other medical organizations to talk to each other more easily. The Centre for Data Science and Digital Health, also known as CREATE, says it’s well along the road to producing the foundational technologies that will enable the interoperability of digital health records across the country.

1 month ago | canhealth.com | Jerry Zeidenberg

Writing about Canadian healthcare in the February 7, 2025 edition of the Globe and Mail, columnist Andre Picard states: “Our health information systems are pitiful, marked by a lack of access and interoperability.”Ouch! To be sure, Canada’s unconnected EMRs and EHRs have driven doctors to exhaustion by forcing them to search for data in countless repositories. They report spending excessive hours looking for computerized information – something that has contributed to physician burnout.

1 month ago | canhealth.com | Jerry Zeidenberg

To help break down the silos of patient data and connect clinicians to the information they need, MEDITECH last year launched Traverse Exchange Canada in Ontario. The network now ties together 43 hospitals using MEDITECH, allowing them to more easily transfer data. What’s more, the system is also connected to over 300 long-term care homes using PointClickCare and all 60 Oracle/Cerner EHR customers in Ontario via the Oracle eHub. Connections to hospitals running on Epic have now begun.

2 months ago | canhealth.com | Jerry Zeidenberg

KINGSTON, ONT. – Kingston Health Sciences Centre (KHSC) has taken delivery of a portable MRI machine and soon plans to deploy it in its Intensive Care Unit (ICU). It’s just the ninth device of its kind to be used in Canada and only the second to be implemented in an ICU – the first is currently in use at St. Michael’s Hospital, in Toronto. The portable MRI, called the Swoop, is produced by Hyperfine Inc., in the United States and distributed in Canada by Upcare Partners of Toronto.