Cerner Innovates Health Information Analysis at Scale with AWS

Cerner, one of the leading suppliers of health information technology (HIT) solutions, has been able to create population health-level tools with Amazon Web Services (AWS). According to Dr. Marc Overhage, former Chief Medical Infomatics Officer and VP of Intelligence Strategy, explains HealtheIntent is a large-scale platform to normalize data using AWS services.

“We’re able to take data from 240 million Americans and expose it to tools for machine learning and incorporation of standardized knowledge, then use that to discover what the data can tell us in a very efficient way,” says Overhage.

In addition, Cerner built HealtheDataLab, a data science toolkit customized for healthcare. “AWS has built a phenomenal set of tools for machine learning, deep learning, and data management. What we can do with HealtheDataLab is take those tools and customize and employ them for healthcare,” explains Overhage. In 2019, Cerner named AWS its preferred cloud and machine learning provider. Cerner has better access to data and can discover knowledge much more quickly with the tools and scalability from AWS services, making it a win for patients.

By not having to focus on basic work with data normalization, “We can focus on the healthcare-specific aspects and deliver more quickly at higher value, and that’s what’s going to make a difference,” says Overhage. 

To learn more about AWS for healthcare and life sciences, visit thinkwithwp.com/health/.