One of the unsung heroes of the healthcare revolution is the widened accessibility and improved collection of data, yet data warehouses have been slower to adopt. Solid data can produce wonders for the effective care of patients, with benefits including faster and earlier diagnosis, faster time to market for new therapies, and the ability to create personalized care plans. Thankfully, there is an incredible amount of data produced by the healthcare industry that can be used towards improving patient outcomes. In fact, 30% of the world’s data output is produced by this sector, and includes information ranging from prescription records to diagnostics. Let’s examine how data warehouses in healthcare are changing the game below.
The Need for Structured Data in Healthcare
However, data usage without proper guardrails can have huge drawbacks. If data is collected without quality control, patients may receive incorrect diagnoses and treatments. In addition, if it is not stored properly with HIPAA-complaint protocol in place, a healthcare organization can be exposed to malpractice risks and lawsuits. Executives are highly aware of these hazards, and 80% of them think the data in their company is not yet ready to address these risks.
Enter Data Warehouses in Healthcare
One of the main issues facing healthcare org’s data usage is all of the fractured sources their data is coming from. Knowledge workers are spending about 30% of their workweek merely chasing down the information they need to do their jobs, which is not surprising considering there is an average of 367 software products large healthcare orgs use to store their information. The use of so many different software tools opens the door to privacy breaches, which is a massive concern for such a highly regulated industry.
Healthcare firms are advised to switch to storing their diverse data in a data warehouse, which is a consolidated, easily accessible repository. These data warehouses are designed to eliminate the “login fatigue” that comes from having to use so many different platforms. More advanced warehouses are also designed to automatically generate custom reports and even use AI to schedule triggers and alerts for important actions.
Conclusion
Many healthcare organizations have held off from building their own warehouses due to the incredible amount of time, money, and resources that would be required of their internal teams. However, there are now third-party warehouses to outsource all the heavy lifting to. These external warehouses only take about 90 days to set up, and come with professional expertise and pre-built templatized models. Using clean and powerful data has never been easier, and the future is looking bright for data-enhanced patient care.
Source: MegaData
