Collaborative technology development efforts between providers and vendors likely will increase as the former continues its search for new avenues to earn revenue, according to University of Pittsburgh Medical Center CIO Dan Drawbaugh.
Drawbaugh, who recently spoke with InformationWeek about trends he sees emerging in health technology, said that recent partnerships--like the one between Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center and IBM focusing on using Watson to improve cancer care, or the one between Mayo Clinic and Silicon Valley Biosytstems to advance personalized medicine through genomics--represent the tip of the iceberg for such opportunities.
"There's a lot of opportunity to leverage the knowledge base that's out there," Drawbaugh said.
Drawbaugh also said he thinks that as more providers opt to become part of accountable care organizations, they'll need to use technology that allows them to "act more like health insurers." A report published last month by IDC Health Insights supports his claim, determining that new analytics tools--particularly those that can help to identify patients in need of care management-- top the investment goals for providers in ACOs.
Roger Neal, CIO at Duncan (Okla.) Regional Hospital and Stephen Stewart, CIO at Henry County Health Center in Mount Pleasant, Iowa--both of whom serve on FierceHealthIT's Editorial Advisory Board--have expressed similar thoughts about regarding tools to support ACO efforts. Stewart, in particular, said that CIOs, in order to make reasonable decisions in this day and age, will be "compelled to turn mountains of data into usable information."
"Risk sharing is risky if you do not have data up front to evaluate your options and make informed decisions from current information," Stewart said.
To learn more:
- read the InformationWeek article