News Release

Reliance Foundation, University of Chicago partner on innovative training technology for doctors

Business Announcement

University of Chicago

Reliance Foundation and the University of Chicago announced a collaboration to develop innovative technology that will help train medical students and clinicians for better diagnosis and improved healthcare. The collaboration is also supporting doctors in real time with evidence-based clinical decision-making tools.

The partnership will develop cloud-based software applications that can train medical professionals using case studies written by experienced physicians and state-of-the-art clinical reasoning methods. Provided through technology partners i-Human Patients, Inc. and AgileMD, the software will help improve medical education and provide point-of-care clinical decision support tools for healthcare practitioners. These tools will help reduce diagnostic errors, improve outcomes and help save many lives.

The programme will be piloted in Reliance Foundation's Sir HN Reliance Foundation Hospital and Research Centre in Mumbai. Reliance Foundation aims to enhance access to quality healthcare in India. "We are excited to collaborate with the University of Chicago, one of the leading universities, in transforming universal delivery of healthcare," said Jagannatha Kumar, CEO, Reliance Foundation. "Through this collaboration, we look forward to bringing in a technology-based revolution in providing medical education and equipping healthcare professionals to achieve greater standards of excellence."

Reliance Foundation is the philanthropic arm of Reliance Industries Ltd., a Fortune Global 500 company and the largest private-sector company in India. The group has so far touched the lives of 4 million people across India through various initiatives in the areas of healthcare, education, livelihoods etc.

"We have developed this evidence-based program which, with the power of technology, can be widely disseminated. Technology should be a democratizing force and India should be able to leapfrog in deployment of such advanced education and health care delivery tools," stated Vinay Kumar, MD, who is the Donald N. Pritzker Professor and Chairman of Department of Pathology at the University of Chicago.

Faculty members of the University of Chicago Medicine, led by Scott Stern, MD, have developed the Symptom to Diagnosis clinical reasoning methodology. This evidence-based approach to clinical reasoning forms the foundation for the clinical education and point-of-care products being developed in collaboration with Reliance Foundation. Stern will lead the case development team made up of leading medical educators from the United States and India.

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About Reliance Foundation

http://www.reliancefoundation.org

Reliance Foundation aims to play a catalytic role in addressing the nation's development challenges through innovative and sustainable solutions with its focus on five core pillars: Rural Transformation, Education, Health, Urban Renewal, and Promotion and protection of India's Arts, Culture and Heritage. Mrs. Nita M. Ambani is the Chairperson of Reliance Foundation and the guiding spirit behind the Foundation's ambitious vision of becoming the leading vehicle for social development, empowering the underprivileged and infusing social transformation in India. Reliance Foundation reaches out to over 5,500 villages and various urban locations across India.

About the University of Chicago

One of the world's premier academic and research institutions, the University of Chicago has driven new ways of thinking since its founding in 1890. With a commitment to free and open inquiry, UChicago scholars take an interdisciplinary approach to research that spans arts to engineering, medicine to education. For more than a century, UChicago scholars have worked around the world to help create new fields of study, and their impact today is greater than ever, with 177,000 alumni and numerous permanent centers around the world. The University of Chicago celebrated the opening of its new Center in Delhi March 28-30, 2014. Delhi joins the University's Center in Beijing, opened in 2010, and the Center in Paris, opened in 2004, in bringing together researchers and students to collaborate across the academic spectrum.

Contact

Tim Honaker
University of Chicago
thonaker@tech.uchicago.edu
1-773-834-3203

Tushar Pania
Reliance Foundation
Tushar.Pania@ril.com
91-98200-88536


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