This last week has really been a step towards working hands on with the projects that I am involved in. I was a part of an initial meeting for a project that involves creating a new algorithm for attributing a certain physician with the length of stay of patients. Currently it is the discharging physician at some of their hospitals that has that patients length of stay in the hospital, even though they may have not had much face time with them. The LOS information is useful for grading physicians and noting who is taking longer than usual or who has the quickest turn around for patients, which is compared with if they are readmitted to the hospital. The new algorithm is based on the doctors notes written about the patient, it uses them to attribute who actually tended to that patient with that patients length of stay compared to the old system which was frequently innacurate. It was very exciting to be a part of a project creating a system that is going to be actually piloted and used within the hospitals. I was able to see how they plan and begin to execute different tasks within this organization, all invaluable experience for the future.
In my other main projects, I have progressed with designing a Twitter user interface to have the program more user friendly in the future and hopefully I can implement that as time progresses. The genomics project has mostly consisted of refining my IT guide to genomics that hopefully I will be presenting soon to the department. I also was able to acquire more data in my prescription drug price project in order to make it more usable and concrete for our hospitals. That project is discussed in more depth in this week's other blog post. Thanks again for checking in.
Kyle Grace
Hey Kyle, it's really cool that you are doing real-world stuff here that could go on to change how the hospitals function. On that note, what would hospitals do with that information about a physician's length of patient stay and what is the goal of creating that algorithm?
ReplyDeleteSo essentially the length of stay, compared against other doctors, gives a picture, in the most basic sense, of how the doctor is performing. Each day the patient stays in the hospital is extra money for them and the hospital so if one physician takes 2 more days than all the others to solve the same issue, assuming that all those patients are not being readmitted for the same issue a few days later, that is an indication they may not be efficient with how they treat patients. There is also a system that uses this data for giving a rating of the doctors based on many factors to essentially award the best doctors.
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