SONIFI Health, a patient engagement technology company, announced a partnership with NESA, a virtual care technology firm.

The aim of the partnership is to enhance patient care and engagement by utilizing SONIFI Health’s interactive TV system.

NESA’s AI-powered technology is implanted into Epic’s ECAL/CAL virtual care platform. NESA deploys its virtual care technology in hospitals, on wall-mounted displays and mobile carts.

The alliance will allow SONIFI to deliver EHR-based virtual care sessions to interactive televisions in patient rooms. 

Virtual care on SONIFI Health’s interactive TV platform is designed to streamline the process for nurses stationed in centralized command centers where they can perform tasks virtually, such as admissions, rounding, patient observation, remote consultations and discharge preparations. 

“Since the vast majority of patients are already familiar with and using the TV in the room, having virtual care also available there will increase patient adoption, as well as let nurses focus on clinical tasks instead of needing to manage additional equipment,” Meghan Seus, SONIFI Health’s senior vice president of product management, said in a statement.

“Clinicians benefit from the native-to-Epic workflow, and patients can use the TV to easily shift between entertainment, education, care details and virtual care anytime throughout their stay.”

THE LARGER TREND

In 2017, SONIFI Health partnered with OpenPlacement’s Patient Choice to help direct a patient’s search for a healthcare professional, hospice, assisted living facility and other providers, by integrating OpenPlacement’s platform with SONIFI’s ecosystem. The process gives patients and their families the opportunity to review transition care choices via videos, photos and reviews.

In March, NESA  partnered with Commend Americas to advance virtual care within the Epic platform and enable two-way audio for the clinical communication solution, the NESA virtual care platform. The partnership allows healthcare organizations to deploy a virtual care solution leveraging their existing investments within Epic and automatically recording clinical incidents in the health record.