When Houston Methodist installed Amazon Echo Dots in its pharmacies and patient rooms, the system halved the time it takes for orders to be signed and medications to be administered by nurses, according to Pharmacy Practice News.
The voice assistant of Amazon Echo Dot, Alexa, answers patient's questions about their medication regimen and helps rapidly verify orders for bleeding reversal agents, the outlet reported June 12. At the three of the system's eight hospitals that have the devices, the time for orders to be signed and medication to be administered reduced by 35%, 40% and 75%.
When patients ask the device about their medications, such as general information or side effects, Alexa relies on the speaker's preloaded database to answer questions. If the device cannot answer a question, the Echo Dot sends a message to the pharmacist within Houston Methodist's EHR. Also, if Alexa cannot recognize a medication pronunciation, the question is sent to the pharmacy department.
In these cases, a pharmacist can then call the patient through the Echo Dot.
The system mounted the Echo Dots in August 2020, Ghalib Abbasi, PharmD, the system's director of pharmacy informatics, told Becker's. Houston Methodist is working to install more at other hospitals and increasing use cases for clinical and operational scenarios.
For example, in the future, the smart speakers could offer ambient listening or answer pharmacists' questions about their patients.