On Innovation: Opinion
Innovation has many different definitions to many different people. In business, innovation is often mixing itself up with research and development (R&D). However, R&D is a fairly limited term that usually refers to the development of new products. In pharma, R&D turns money into knowledge. Innovation is the process of creating business out of this knowledge. Up until recently, innovation in the care provider environment was limited although its focus was with varied, yet astonishing advances made in medicine. The packaging and delivery of the treatment was inefficient, sometimes ineffective, and certainly not user friendly.
In most cases, complex systems are built to oppose change. Nowhere is this more real than in the U.S. Healthcare Industry. In fact this industry, in the U.S., is of the most complex industries in the world. Its rigor and methods are in place to manage and mitigate risks while saving lives. Intrinsically woven together are its policies, commitments to uphold its oath to the patient, the environment, culture, and technological factors. Illness trends and HCP demographics also contribute to the shifts in our overall healthcare system.
It was around 2010, Dr. L and his wife ran away from our “Benefits of EHR” seminar we were giving at a local college. When we met later, she explained to me that having had fled from communist Russia in 1989, during Glasnost, to the United States, their fears were that government repression would happen again but this time on U.S. soil. Dr. L and his wife were not unusual regarding their immediate feelings at the time with other physicians (although aligning the EHR implementation to Communist Russia was a bit far reaching).
Eventually, these physicians did accept the advantages to implement an EHR systems. It had just been over a decade when physicians were using only paper charts. The innovation of electronic health records, beyond payer management applications, was unwelcomed and viewed as a government instrument to mandate physician frameworks. It was considered an unhelpful tool that would inundate physicians with costs and excessive burdens. Through the governments national mandate for the health care providers to accomplish the goal was effective with the carrot/stick approach. Once the groundwork was laid, the opportunity became obvious and evolution was not just inevitable but affordable, secure, robust, scalable, and efficient and provide high performance.
Most hospitalized patients need to be monitored, continuously. The data observed and analyzed takes large computer power and its costly. To further add to the costs, maintaining its integrity and reliability against highly targeted data adds more costs to its scrutiny and safety. A tamper‐proof and hack free system is an ever-increasing task because there will always be a form of malicious terrorism wanting to have access. Cyber security surrounds the data shield.
Of these longstanding industry inefficiencies are now a primary focus to allow for safe yet affordable, consumer experiences with greater outcomes and improved quality. As the technology giants lock horns in this trillion-dollar battle over cloud technology market share, corporate funding for digital health companies is at its highest ever in history and during this COVID-19 pandemic.
Today, technology has become the here with the 'war' on COVID-19. As our society evolves, so does its healthcare requirements. Here are few items that have augmented the possibilities for society to continue in the face of this crisis:
Never have the stakes been higher nor has the capability been so available. Payers, providers, healthcare services, and technology firms are acquiring assets to extend their data and analytics capabilities and engage with patients. The proposed regulatory changes offer more integrated data sharing and greater transparency for consumers. In abundance, digital health companies, new technologies, collaboration, Innovation Labs and Centers of Excellence are cash rich. These are the parts to the whole for these mega-deals to advance the ecosystem.
In most cases, complex systems are built to oppose change. Nowhere is this more real than in the U.S. Healthcare Industry. In fact this industry, in the U.S., is of the most complex industries in the world. Its rigor and methods are in place to manage and mitigate risks while saving lives. Intrinsically woven together are its policies, commitments to uphold its oath to the patient, the environment, culture, and technological factors. Illness trends and HCP demographics also contribute to the shifts in our overall healthcare system.
It was around 2010, Dr. L and his wife ran away from our “Benefits of EHR” seminar we were giving at a local college. When we met later, she explained to me that having had fled from communist Russia in 1989, during Glasnost, to the United States, their fears were that government repression would happen again but this time on U.S. soil. Dr. L and his wife were not unusual regarding their immediate feelings at the time with other physicians (although aligning the EHR implementation to Communist Russia was a bit far reaching).
Eventually, these physicians did accept the advantages to implement an EHR systems. It had just been over a decade when physicians were using only paper charts. The innovation of electronic health records, beyond payer management applications, was unwelcomed and viewed as a government instrument to mandate physician frameworks. It was considered an unhelpful tool that would inundate physicians with costs and excessive burdens. Through the governments national mandate for the health care providers to accomplish the goal was effective with the carrot/stick approach. Once the groundwork was laid, the opportunity became obvious and evolution was not just inevitable but affordable, secure, robust, scalable, and efficient and provide high performance.
Most hospitalized patients need to be monitored, continuously. The data observed and analyzed takes large computer power and its costly. To further add to the costs, maintaining its integrity and reliability against highly targeted data adds more costs to its scrutiny and safety. A tamper‐proof and hack free system is an ever-increasing task because there will always be a form of malicious terrorism wanting to have access. Cyber security surrounds the data shield.
Of these longstanding industry inefficiencies are now a primary focus to allow for safe yet affordable, consumer experiences with greater outcomes and improved quality. As the technology giants lock horns in this trillion-dollar battle over cloud technology market share, corporate funding for digital health companies is at its highest ever in history and during this COVID-19 pandemic.
Today, technology has become the here with the 'war' on COVID-19. As our society evolves, so does its healthcare requirements. Here are few items that have augmented the possibilities for society to continue in the face of this crisis:
- Internet of Things (IoT) provides seamless integration of various smart devices to enable the integration of different sensors
- Cloud computing provides computational resources to remotely execute diverse tasks and provide results to a plethora of applications
- Computing resources and sensors allow perception of external environment and actuators provide users utility physical response to different applications like healthcare, transportation, surveillance
- Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) provide users with high quality services, low response times, scalability and robustness to different user needs due to modern AI applications becoming data intensive
- 3-D printing was one of the most touted technologies, with many tech commentators comparing its emergence to the invention of the printing press. 3-D printing allows for physical objects to be produced by specialized hardware following instructions set out in a computer-aided design document.
- DNA analysis may help for future understanding. Think about Ancestry.com. It is the global leader in digital family history services, operating in more than 30 countries. The company has over 3.6 million subscribers, with annual revenue of over $1 billion. The company harnesses the information found in family trees and historical records to help people gain a new level of understanding about their lives. Ancestry also operates a market-leading consumer genomics business, which informs consumers about their heritage and key health characteristics.
- Enter point-of-care testing (POCT). POCT occurs wherever the patient currently is, whether that’s a doctor’s office, hospital bed or ambulance. To deliver quick results on the spot, POCT leverages technologies such as biosensors and labs-on-a-chip. For example, a lab-on-a-chip integrates multiple laboratory functions into a single compact circuit that can perform high-throughput screening and work with even very small samples.
- Artificial Intelligence and Blockchain are grid and signature elements
Never have the stakes been higher nor has the capability been so available. Payers, providers, healthcare services, and technology firms are acquiring assets to extend their data and analytics capabilities and engage with patients. The proposed regulatory changes offer more integrated data sharing and greater transparency for consumers. In abundance, digital health companies, new technologies, collaboration, Innovation Labs and Centers of Excellence are cash rich. These are the parts to the whole for these mega-deals to advance the ecosystem.
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