里贝拉利用人工智能技术为患者和医生提供帮助。
内容总结：
面对全球医疗资源紧张、人口老龄化及慢性病负担加剧的普遍挑战，西班牙私立医疗集团Ribera通过创新技术应用开辟医疗系统转型新路径。该集团旗下16家医院和74家医疗中心年服务患者超200万，正借助人工智能与数据技术提升医疗效率，实现"以相同资源提供更优质服务"的目标。
Ribera自主研发的Cynara公民健康管理平台是技术落地的核心载体。该平台不仅提供预约挂号、在线问诊等基础功能，更通过微软技术架构实现慢性病患者的实时健康监测与个性化干预。数据显示，参与该项目的重症慢性病患者急诊就诊率下降23%，30天内再入院率降低18%，血糖管理等健康指标显著改善。
在人工智能领域，Ribera已投入四年多时间推进三大目标：数据分类、深度分析和预测建模。其开发的机器学习模型能精准预测压疮风险、跌倒概率及术后感染可能性，辅助医生提前采取干预措施。同时，生成式AI被用于自动化生成白内障手术等常规医疗文书，减轻医务人员行政负担。
集团首席转型官曼努埃尔·博世强调，技术应用始终以伦理和法律合规为前提，所有数据均经匿名化处理，并与微软合作构建安全防护体系。他比喻道："AI如同医生的GPS导航系统——决策权始终在医生手中，技术只是让诊疗过程更高效、更精准。"
通过将技术创新与医疗服务深度融合，Ribera为应对全球性医疗资源挑战提供了具有借鉴意义的数字化解决方案。
中文翻译：
里贝拉集团运用人工智能技术助力医患双赢
全球几乎所有国家的医疗系统都面临全方位压力。随着人口老龄化加剧和慢性病患病率上升，医疗需求持续增长，但医护人员的培养速度却跟不上需求扩张。预算紧缩与医护人员超负荷工作已成为常态。
"西班牙面临的困境与其他国家并无二致，"里贝拉集团转型总监曼努埃尔·博世·阿科斯坦言。这家私营医疗运营商在西班牙、葡萄牙及中欧地区拥有16家医院和74个医疗中心，年均服务患者超200万人次。为应对日益增长的就诊需求及相应成本，该集团正依托数据与技术推动医疗系统升级。
"技术创新是企业的核心驱动力，"博世强调，"我们并非传统医疗机构。与政府签订的医疗服务合同以质量为导向，这赋予我们更大的创新空间。必须依靠扎实的数据支撑，才能确保医疗实践真正惠及患者、企业乃至整个医疗体系。"
里贝拉将科技与数据视为医疗变革的关键抓手。"我们正在重新定义数据应用模式，构建可实时定制的医疗解决方案，"他补充道。
（配图说明：里贝拉集团转型总监曼努埃尔·博世·阿科斯，米格尔·维斯卡伊诺为微软拍摄）
慢性病患者群体虽然占比不大，却消耗了大量医疗资源，其中多数人往往同时罹患多种疾病。改善这类患者的健康状况，既能提升医疗系统运行效率，又能切实提高患者生活质量。
集团旗下科技子公司Futurs开发的"Cynara公民门户"不仅具备常规医院门户功能——如预约挂号、化验单上传、在线咨询及通过Microsoft Teams进行远程会诊——更创新性地采用枢纽式管理模式，整合每位患者涉及的全部医疗资源，为其制定个性化数字健康方案并实施持续监测。
■ Cynara技术体系的多层架构
"Cynara"得名于洋蓟属植物——在初始开发团队所在的阿利坎特南部地区，这种多层重叠的蔬菜备受推崇。博世以此比喻平台众多且相互协同的功能模块。集团对微软工具的应用同样呈现分层特点：采用Dynamics 365客户服务中心、OpenAI模型支持生成式AI项目、Azure机器学习工具处理非生成式AI应用，同时部署Microsoft Fabric、Dynamics Business Central和Microsoft 365 Copilot。
通过该平台，医护人员可实时追踪患者（尤其慢性病患者）健康指标，及时干预突发状况。部分慢性病患者往往延误治疗直至病情恶化不得不急诊就医，而现在医务人员能远程监测关键指标，主动指导患者规避健康风险。
"应用系统已与临床结果实现数据联动，"博世表示，"患者血糖控制水平明显提升，急诊就诊频率显著下降。"数据显示，参与"Cynara公民健康管理计划"的三级慢性病（最复杂级别）患者，对比计划启动前同期数据，急诊就诊量减少23%，30天内再住院率降低18%。这些患者接受技术增强型临床管理已超过12个月。
更广泛而言，基于微软技术构建的该平台能有效填补护理空白，助力患者遵循健康计划，减少急诊需求。例如当系统实时监测到糖尿病患者血糖骤降时，医护人员可立即致电指导干预，避免患者陷入昏迷或需要呼叫救护车的危急状况。博世指出，由于患者清楚知悉医疗团队成员并能随时联系，其就医体验和诊疗可及性得到实质性提升。依托微软Azure云平台，该系统可实现安全便捷的全天候访问。
■ 里贝拉的人工智能战略布局
Cynara公民门户仅是集团科技应用的一隅。四年来，里贝拉持续加码人工智能投资，聚焦数据分类、深度洞察与预测预警三大目标。通过机器学习实现信息智能归类，既帮助医生更精准把握病例特征（如识别高再入院风险患者以调整治疗方案），也提升患者对病情的认知水平。集团已开发出基于Azure机器学习的压疮风险预测模型（医院重点关注领域）及患者跌倒风险预警系统。
"人工智能的优势在于海量信息处理能力，"里贝拉质量总监兼Futurs产品经理米雷娅·拉迪奥斯·马丁解释道，"不仅能处理5个参数，更能同时分析30个难以人工获取的隐藏变量——这些数据可能深藏在实验室报告中，人工收集根本不可能实现。"AI工具与传统风险评估量表形成有效互补。
以术后感染监测为例：医师团队会复查所有手术患者30天或60天后的感染情况，随后通过数据挖掘技术提取所有感染相关要素，最终生成的模型可为每位患者生成风险评分，高分者将获得重点监测。
在生成式AI领域，集团正推进多个减轻医生文书负担的项目。例如通过AI自动生成白内障手术等常规操作的出院文件，将医护人员从行政事务中解放出来，更专注于临床诊疗。
■ 数据安全与伦理准则
集团对所有数据实行完全匿名化处理，并与微软合作确保医疗场景中的数据安全防护及AI应用的合法合规性。"我们必须严格把控患者隐私保护，审慎对待信息传输的内容、路径与方式，"博世强调。里贝拉还会严格审查企业及医疗场景中AI应用的伦理正当性与法律依据，将其比作出租车司机使用GPS导航："技术始终辅助决策，但掌控方向的永远是医生这位'驾驶员'。"
"当前医疗需求已远超系统承载能力，"博世总结道，"我们必须用同等资源实现更优质高效的服务。提升医疗效能与价值输出，这才是破局之道。"
英文来源：
Ribera uses AI technology to help patients and doctors
Healthcare is squeezed on all sides, in nearly every country. The number of new doctors and nurses isn’t keeping up with the greater demand for healthcare that comes with an aging population that has more chronic diseases. Budgets are tight. Healthcare professionals are overworked.
“In Spain, we have the same problems as everywhere,” says Manuel Bosch Arcos, chief transformation officer of Ribera, a private healthcare operator of 16 hospitals and 74 medical centers in Spain, Portugal and Central Europe, serving more than two million patients a year. To deal with higher demand and the costs that go with it, Ribera is counting on data and technology to help improve healthcare systems for their patients.
“A key part of the company is technology,” Bosch says. “We are not a traditional healthcare company. We have contracts with the government based on the quality of care, so we can be more innovative. We need strong data to ensure that what we do is good for patients, the company and the healthcare system.”
Ribera sees technology and data as the way to transform the healthcare system. “What we are doing is rethinking data and rethinking the way healthcare could be tailored – and doing that in real time,” he says.
Manuel Bosch Arcos, chief transformation officer of Ribera. Photo by Miguel Vizcaíno for Microsoft.
A small percentage of patients accounts for a large portion of healthcare spending because they have chronic conditions, usually several simultaneously. Improving these patients’ health is a boon to the system – and to themselves, of course.
Ribera’s technology subsidiary, Futurs, created the Cynara Citizen portal to do the things hospital portals do – let patients make appointments, upload lab results, ask questions or do tele-consultations with their providers through Microsoft Teams – but also to coordinate a hub management approach to patient care where the providers involved in each patient’s care can get together to develop a personalized digital health plan for the patient and monitor it.
The many layers of Cynara technology
The name Cynara is the genus for artichokes, which are highly prized in the southern part of Alicante, where the initial development team is located. But the name is also symbolic of the way the portal’s many functionalities, sometimes layered and overlapping, are like petals of an artichoke, Bosch says. Ribera’s use of Microsoft tools is similarly layered. It employs Dynamics 365 Contact Center, OpenAI models for generative AI projects, Azure Machine Learning tools for non-generative AI applications, Microsoft Fabric, Dynamics Business Central and Microsoft 365 Copilot.
Through Cynara Citizen, Ribera health professionals can track health indicators from patients – with particular focus on those with chronic diseases – to quickly address problems without waiting until the patients’ next appointment. Some chronically ill patients might tend to do nothing until their condition worsens to the point that they have to go to the emergency room; through Cynara Citizen, health professionals can check key health indicators remotely and proactively tell the patient what to do to avoid a health emergency.
“We have linked the app with clinical results,” Bosch says. “Patients are getting better blood glucose control and not going to the emergency room as often.” Level 3 patients, those with the most complex cases of chronic conditions, who were enrolled in the Cynara Citizen Population Health Management Program showed a 23 percent drop in emergency room visits and an 18 percent decrease in readmissions within 30 days, compared with a year earlier, which was before Cynara Citizen launched, according to Ribera. The patients had been in the clinical program enhanced with technology for at least 12 months. Ribera compared the level of use of the services of patients before and after being included in the program.
More broadly, Cynara Citizen, which Ribera developed with Microsoft technology, can reduce care gaps, helping patients follow their health plans so they are less likely to have to go to the emergency room. By seeing in real time whether, for example, a diabetic patient has a drop in glucose levels, Ribera health professionals can call the patient and get them to react before the glucose levels fall to the point that an ambulance has to be called, or that the patient falls into a coma. Because patients know who the professionals are on their care team and can message them in addition to making appointments, Ribera believes patients feel they are getting good care and good access, Bosch says. Since the app runs on Microsoft Azure, it can be easily and securely accessed from nearly anywhere.
Ribera’s active investment in AI
“The advantage is that you can collect much more information. Not just five items but maybe 30, using variables that are not easy to find – maybe they are in the labs and if a person has to collect them manually, it’s impossible.”
Mireia Ladios Martin, head of quality at Ribera and product manager for Futurs. Photo by Miguel Vizcaíno for Microsoft.
Cynara Citizen is just one way Ribera is using technology. For more than four years, Ribera has been actively investing in AI with three goals in mind – sorting data, refining that into better insights and predicting. It expects machine learning to classify information and doctors and patients better understanding of cases, such as spotting patterns that signal a patient has a high probability of being readmitted to the hospital, so care can be adjusted accordingly. For example, it developed a model using Azure Machine Learning to identify patients at risk of developing pressure ulcers, a huge concern in hospitals. Another model can predict the risk of patients falling.
“The advantage is that you can collect much more information. Not just five items but maybe 30, using variables that are not easy to find – maybe they are in the labs and if a person has to collect them manually, it’s impossible,” says Mireia Ladios Martin, head of quality at Ribera and product manager for Futurs. The AI tools complement the traditional risk assessment scales.
For example, Ribera wants to identify patients who have infections at their surgical site after their operation. A team of physicians reviewed every patient who had surgery and noted whether they had an infection after 30 or 60 days. Then Ribera used data mining to identify everything related to infection. The resulting model delivers a score for each patient, so those with high scores can be flagged for closer looks.
Generative AI can create content; in that realm, Ribera is exploring several projects to lighten the administrative burden on doctors. One uses AI to generate discharge papers for some routine procedures, such as cataract surgery, to relieve doctors of certain administrative tasks so they can devote more time to actual patient care.
Ribera fully anonymizes data and works with Microsoft to ensure safeguards around data security and the ethical and legal rationales of AI in the healthcare setting. “We need to be very cautious about patient privacy, about which kind of information we send, where and how,” Bosch says, adding that Ribera also carefully examines the rationale for using AI in corporate and health applications, to ensure it is ethical and legal.
Bosch compares Ribera’s use of AI to a taxi driver using GPS – the driver, or in Ribera’s case the doctor, is still in charge and making decisions, but the technology can help speed the process and reduce stress.
“There’s more demand than the current system can provide,” Bosch says, “so we need to do more and better with the same resources. We need to be more efficient and provide more value.”