When Lesley Colwell provides care for children in Batson Children's Hospital's Pediatric Intensive Care Unit, she spends a little more time at their bedside than she could a week ago.

An Epic program that automatically gathers patients' vital signs from their monitors debuted in the PICU March 7. As a result, front-line caregivers no longer have to manually enter numbers on 10 vital sign variables - including heart rate, blood pressure, respiratory rate and oxygen saturation - into a computer.

Instead, Epic captures the information in a “vital signs complex flowsheet,” that is ready to be viewed within a minute after the information has been recorded.

Most Americans communicate with their representatives through emails, voice mails or tweets. A University of Mississippi Medical Center faculty member talked to hers - and several others - face-to-face in Washington, D.C.

Dr. Jennifer Sasser, assistant professor of pharmacology and toxicology, testified to the Senate Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education Appropriations Subcommittee March 8. The hearing, “Saving Lives through Medical Research,” included Sasser and three other researchers who addressed the importance of federal funding for medical research.

“This steady support is critical to my future, the future of my students and research assistants and, most importantly, to countless people who will receive better care due to the work funded by [the National Institutes of Health],” she said.

Several interesting events are scheduled for the upcoming week at the Medical Center.