Health Researchers hope new software will have dramatic effect in saving premature babies

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Michael Oliveira
THE CANADIAN PRESS

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TORONTO - Researchers hope computer software to be tested at Toronto's Hospital for Sick Children will have a dramatic effect in saving the lives of premature babies and will take neonatal care to a completely new level.

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New computer software being tested in Canada can handle a constant stream of physiological readings for premature babies, elevating neonatal care.

The goal of the research project involving the University of Ontario Institute of Technology and new IBM software is to help clinicians make better decisions about treatment at a faster pace.

Currently, babies are connected to monitors that provide a variety of data on paper and onscreen, but the information is only stored for up to 24 hours and then discarded.

The new software can handle a constant stream of physiological readings - monitoring things like heart rate, respiration, blood pressure and oxygen levels in the blood. It can process 512 readings per second and screen the results for problems or patterns.

"This will elevate neonatal care to a completely new level - which really should be more sophisticated, better care - and would hopefully be associated with better outcomes for the infants," Dr. Andrew James, a staff physician at the hospital, said Tuesday.

"It should prevent these babies from getting as sick as they do, so it may influence mortality and it might influence the costs of caring for these infants."

He said the software, which was being unveiled Wednesday, could help clinicians do a better job of identifying life-threatening infections, which can be detected up to 24 hours before onset by observing changes in physiological data.

"Premature babies are at very high risk for infection and the signs of infection are really quite subtle until the infection is well established," James said.

"So if we can use this new technology to recognize changes and intervene with antibiotics much earlier than we currently do, we'll prevent these babies from getting as sick as they do."

The research is being led by Dr. Carolyn McGregor, a Canada research chair in health informatics, who came to Canada from Australia to take part in cutting-edge research in new health-care technologies.

"I've come across to Canada... to make people realize there's a great need to revolutionize the technology uptake within neonatal intensive care," she said Tuesday.

"These are people with lifelong potential and if we can help the clinicians so they can improve survival rates and quality of life it's going to have a dramatic effect on health-care costs."

She said the technology is also being tested with the intention of it being used around the world, particularly in places where premature babies have high mortality rates.

"In China, if a child is born in a rural or remote setting it's nine times more likely that they will not survive if they're born early or born at term with a significant health issue," she said.

James said the research is being envisioned as a five-year project and funding of between $3 million to $5 million must still be granted before the technology can be fully implemented.