For the first time, a team of physicians at the Rio 2016 Olympics have succeeded in managing health records through a single system. GE Healthcare supplied the International Olympic Committee with health data management software to create EHRs for all athletes and patients who visit the Polyclinic in the Olympic Village.

By supporting more than 1,000 physicians and over 10,500 athletes, the system is accomplishing, on a smaller scale, the kind of integrated functionality that health IT innovators have been pursuing for years. The EHR allows the physicians to track and examine thousands of data points in real time, including imaging scans, medications, dental exams, and allergies. All of that information can be accessed on the same cloud platform.

So far, the EHR has tracked over 4,000 medical records including 1,085 diagnostic imaging exams — 610 MR exams, 345 X-ray and 130 ultrasound exams.

In the Sochi 2014 Paralympics Winter Games, there was an athlete who fell in the snow and suffered a medulla lesion, which compromised his breathing capability. He wasn’t able to speak, so the physician accessed his health record and verified that he had allergies, and was able to determine the amount of anticoagulants he'd ingested.

“It is hard to imagine that just one or two years ago, we would not have been able to access this information,” Dr. Bill Moreau, the physician who treated the patient and managing director of the sports medicine division for the United States Olympic Committee (USOC), said in a statement.

In Rio the availability of important patient information may be greater than ever.

For the athletes in Rio representing smaller or developing countries, having access to the facilities at Olympic Village means an opportunity to capitalize on medical attention not available at home, according to USA Today. For those individuals, utilizing the cutting-edge services for basic checkups and preventative care is a perk to competing on the world stage.

With two MR machines provided by GE, Olympic physicians have been conducting about 60 exams per day.

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