Re-Imagining How We Provide And Govern Health Care Using Open Data

Earlier this week, entrepreneurs, data scientists, doctors, health IT innovators, and representatives from Washington gathered for the 4th Annual Health Datapalooza Conference in Washington DC.  What started 4 years ago as a 45 person gathering, now attracts almost 2000 participants. The two-day event included breakout sessions and app demos that explored innovative ways to leverage the opening of government health data to engage patients, improve clinical outcomes, and (if done right) bend the health cost curve.

The various panels at the Conference highlighted four key drivers toward re-imagining how we provide and govern health care:

1. Cost: Open health data may spur innovations that have the potential to improve the quality of care delivered while reducing costs. In the United States, National Healthcare Expenditure is hovering around $3 trillion. The United States spends more on health per capita than any other country by a sizeable margin and yet ranks poorly in both health and quality of services—innovations that improve quality and drive down costs have an eager market.  A potential of the use of open health data includes clinical decision support through technologies that provide advanced analytics at the point of care. For example, Humedica Mindshare helps providers identify high-risk patients and target resources accordingly.