In a bid to advance rare disease diagnosis, Pittsburgh-based Allegheny Health Network began leveraging Epic's "Look-Alikes" tool.
This technology aims to streamline the complex process of diagnosing and treating rare conditions by connecting Allegheny Health Network's physicians with counterparts nationwide who have encountered similar cases. The Look-Alikes tool utilizes Epic's Cosmos dataset, which includes de-identified information from more than 257 million patients and encompasses 12.2 billion patient encounters across 1,500 Epic-affiliated hospitals and 352,000 physicians worldwide, as reported in an Aug. 15 news release.
With Look-Alikes, Allegheny's physicians can query this dataset to find and collaborate with physicians who have treated patients with similar symptoms. Furthermore, the system allows physicians who have successfully diagnosed rare conditions to flag their cases in the Cosmos dataset, enabling other medical professionals to consult them if they encounter comparable cases.
The Look-Alikes tool currently tracks symptoms associated with 37 rare diseases, such as erythropoietic protoporphyria, Beckwith-Wiedemann syndrome and Friedreich ataxia.
The health system began using the technology in June.