Using It or Losing It? The Case for Data Scientists Inside Health Care

As much as 30% of the entire world’s stored data is generated in the health care industry. A single patient typically generates close to 80 megabytes each year in imaging and electronic medical record (EMR) data. This trove of data has obvious clinical, financial, and operational value for the health care industry, and the new value pathways that such data could enable have been estimated by McKinsey to be worth more than $300 billion annually in reduced costs alone. If appropriate investments in data science are not made in-house, then hospitals and health systems will run the risk of becoming reliant on outsiders to analyze the data that ultimately will be used to inform decisions and drive innovation.”

However, we believe that the health care industry does not currently appreciate the inherent value of these data, which can only be fully harnessed through better data analytics. Furthermore, we maintain that if appropriate investments in data science are not made in-house, then hospitals and health systems will run the risk of becoming reliant on outsiders to analyze the data that ultimately will be used to inform decisions and drive innovation. In order to be successful, therefore, health care organizations will need to capture the value of their data by investing in data analytics and establishing this skill as a core competency.

The value of data is realized only when this raw information is converted into knowledge that changes practice. That value arises through, for example, better and faster identification of shortfalls in adherence, compliance, and evidence-based care; more comprehensive sharing of data and insights inside a hospital and with health insurance partners and community stakeholders; and more customized partnering with individual patients to drive understanding of chronic conditions, enhance adherence and compliance, boost self-care, and avoid more costly treatments at more costly sites of care within a hospital’s overall population base...