Electronic ICU's

Is this the wave of the future, or just cutting corners to the max? Who's putting in the central line at 2:30 AM, a robot? What do you think?

A new intensive care unit technology, however, has worked wonders in one critical corner of the hospital, helping Swedish Medical and others in the often information technology-averse hospital field improve patient safety, reduce complications, and, as a result, shorten patient stays and save money. Many of the more than 100 hospitals around the U.S. that have bolstered their intensive care units with the virtual or eICU facilities designed by venture-backed Visicu say they are confident the technology has saved lives by reducing the incidence of often-deadly hospital-related infections.

Visicu's virtual eICU enables staff doctors to monitor all of the ICU patients from five computer screens in a command center that is sometimes built inside the hospital, or sometimes set up miles away. One U.S. military hospital in Hawaii has even used the technology to oversee ICU operations at an affiliated Navy hospital in Guam.