The University of Maryland Strategic Partnership announced this week a transformative partnership to establish the University of Maryland Institute for Health Informatics 3, or UM-3-IHC.
WHY IS IT IMPORTANT
The effort is led by the University of Maryland, Baltimore, and the University of Maryland, College Park, in conjunction with the University of Maryland Medical System and Montgomery County, Maryland.
The goal is to harness advances in artificial intelligence and machine learning to assess secure, anonymized and health data to diagnose, prevent, and treat disease in patients across the state of Maryland.
The new institute will focus on algorithms to enable accurate patient care for diabetes, high blood pressure, opioid overdose risk and other health risks.
“The scaling up of research to address grand challenges in the life sciences has shifted from collecting data to using cutting-edge technology to uncover meaningful patterns hidden in data,” said Darryll J. Pines, president of the University of Maryland, College Park, in a statement.
“This institute will bring in world-class researchers who explore artificial intelligence, machine learning, and virtual and augmented reality to collaborate with medical experts, which will have broad impacts on human health and well-being. .”
Researchers will also explore how immersive wireless and 5G technologies can increase the availability and efficiency of telehealth, and how virtual and augmented reality on 5G networks will expand diagnostic capabilities for clinicians.
The institute is expected to open in leased space in early 2023, with final completion of labs and offices in the North Bethesda metro area in 2028, officials said. Initial funding of $25 million is provided by MPower. The Montgomery County government will provide an additional $40 million to develop the permanent site.
“We are witnessing an unprecedented revolution in healthcare that is driven by biomedical innovation, digitization of medical records and advances in machine learning and artificial intelligence,” said the president of the UMB, Dr. Bruce E. Jarrell, in a statement. “This new Institute will include all of these elements in a synergistic effect that will transform our healthcare system.”
THE GREAT TREND
The Maryland officials behind UM-3-IHC note that North Bethesda’s proximity to NIST, NIH, FDA, Walter Reed and the Naval Medical Research Center makes it an ideal location for research into point. The institute will bring together researchers from two leading academic partners in these fields to explore how emerging technologies can facilitate knowledge discovery for human health and well-being.
The Institute will catalyze a clinical data science ecosystem at North Bethesda that attracts FDA and NIH investigators, UMB and UMCP faculty, medical bioinformatics educational programs and students, and partners from industry, enabling the expansion of “dry” computer labs, virtual meeting rooms and classrooms.
Earlier this year, we reported how the University of Maryland School of Medicine expanded its telemedicine program to better reach patients in need of care.
In March, we described how the Center for Tech Innovation at the University of Maryland Medical System/UMD School of Medicine created a custom secure messaging platform, integrated with its EHR, that used a secure messaging API to more flexibility and scalability.
REGISTRATION
“Our vision is for this to become the East Coast’s Silicon Valley for health informatics. The goals of this new institute align well with the University of Maryland School of Medicine’s new strategic vision to use disruptive technology and to embrace and harness the power of clinical analytics and precision medicine to improve patient care and deliver health services to the population,” said Dr. Mark T. Gladwin, Vice-Chancellor chair of medical affairs at the University of Maryland, Baltimore.
“Anonymized data from 1.8 million patients within our system, together with clinical research data from UMB, will provide the backbone for advanced clinical analytics that could ultimately lead to faster diagnoses, improvements in the way therapies are used and to a range of other improved outcomes for our patients, as well as patients around the world,” said Dr. Mohan Suntha, President and CEO of the Medical System of the ‘University of Maryland.
Twitter: @MikeMilliardHITN
Email the author: mike.miliard@himssmedia.com
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