Chicago-based Northwestern Medicine has embedded OpenEvidence’s AI clinical decision-support platform in its Epic EHR, giving physicians, nurses, pharmacists and other clinicians systemwide access at the point of care.
Clinicians have been able to launch OpenEvidence directly from Epic since Oct. 8. They are signed in automatically through their existing hospital credentials, according to an Oct. 12 news release. The rollout also opens the tool to Northwestern’s nurses, pharmacists and other clinical staff for the first time.
Care teams can use the platform to check medication dosing and drug interactions, review current guidelines and get cited answers drawn from peer-reviewed literature. That literature includes content from the New England Journal of Medicine and the JAMA Network.
The organizations described the enterprisewide deployment as the first phase of a broader collaboration focused on using AI safely and effectively at the bedside.
James Adams, MD, chief medical officer of Northwestern Medicine, said the health system prioritizes technologies that address real clinical needs and can scale across the enterprise. Dr. Adams said the integration gives clinicians “a single, trusted source for evidence-based answers at the point of care.”
Ania Bilski, MD, vice president of clinical AI at OpenEvidence, said embedding the tool in Northwestern’s EHR delivers real-time insights “without adding complexity.” Vivien Ho, senior vice president of strategic partnerships at OpenEvidence, said extending access to the full care team “reflects where modern hospitals are headed.” Ms. Ho credited Northwestern’s collaborative approach with making the deployment possible.
OpenEvidence said it plans to continue building clinical workflows for care teams with Northwestern Medicine.
