Analytics

The use of big data in the health sector

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Before we discuss big data in the health sector, it is good to know what big data is.

Understanding big data

Great information is a term that describes the vast amounts of data, both structured and unstructured, that inundate businesses every day. But it’s not the amount of data that matters. It’s what the organization does with the data that matters.

Big data can be analyzed for insights that lead to better strategic business decisions and moves.

The concept of Big Data has been around for years. Most organizations now understand that if they collect all the data that flows into their business, they can apply analytics and derive significant value from that data. However, the new benefits that big data analytics bring are speed and efficiency.

The importance of big data

  1. Reduce costs. Big data technologies such as Hadoop and cloud-based analytics offer significant cost benefits for storing large amounts of data, plus they can identify more efficient ways of doing business.
  2. Faster and better decision making With the speed of Hadoop and in-memory analytics, along with the ability to analyze new data sources, companies can instantly analyze information and make decisions based on what they learn.
  3. New products and services. With the ability to measure customer needs and satisfaction through analytics comes the power to deliver what customers want.

Applications of big data in healthcare

Hadoop technology to monitor vital patient conditions

Several hospitals around the world have used Hadoop to help their staff work effectively with big data. Without Hadoop, analyzing the unstructured data of most healthcare systems would be nearly impossible.

Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta cares for more than 6,200 children in the ICU. The average length of stay in the pediatric ICU ranged from one month to one year. Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta uses bedside sensors that help them continuously track a patient’s vitals such as blood pressure, heart rate and breathing.

This sensor produces very large data and the old system is not able to store more than 3 days of data due to storage costs.

In fact, this hospital needs to store vital signs for analysis. If there is a change in the pattern, the medical team and other assistants should be alerted. This system was successfully implemented using the Hadoop ecosystem component. Objective: To reduce ED visits and hospitalizations for asthma-related events in children.

Capacity Health: Improving Service Quality and Reimbursement

Valence Health uses Hadoop to build a data lake that is the company’s primary data repository. Valence processes 3000 incoming data feeds with 45 data types every day. This critical data includes laboratory test results, medical record data, prescriptions, immunizations, medications, claims and payments, as well as physician and hospital claims, which are used to inform revenue and reimbursement decisions.

The rapid growth of the number of customers and the increase in the volume of related data puts more pressure on the existing infrastructure.

Before using big data, they needed up to 22 hours to process 20 million records of laboratory data. Using big data reduces the cycle time from 22 hours to 20 minutes and uses much less hardware. Valence Health is also able to handle customer requests that were previously difficult to fill.

Hadoop in cancer medicine and genomics

One of the biggest reasons that cancer has not been eradicated is that cancer mutates in different patterns and reacts in different ways based on a person’s genetic makeup.

Therefore, researchers in the field of oncology state that to treat cancer, patients should be treated based on the genetics of each patient, according to the type of cancer.

UnitedHealthcare: Fraud, Waste and Abuse

Currently, at least 10% of health insurance payments are related to fraudulent claims. These items are estimated to be worth billions of dollars worldwide. False claims are not a new problem, but the sophistication of insurance fraud appears to be increasing exponentially, making it difficult for health insurance companies to deal with it.

UnitedHealthCare is an insurance company that provides health benefits and services to nearly 51 million people. The company works with more than 850,000 healthcare workers and around 6,100 hospitals across the country. Their payment integrity group/payment integrity department is responsible for ensuring correct and timely payment of receivables.

Interface Technologies: Records Flow System for Health Care

Liaison Technologies provides cloud-based solutions to help organizations integrate, manage and secure data across the organization.

One of the vertical solutions they provide is for the healthcare and life sciences industry, which must respond to two challenges: meeting HIPAA requirements and dealing with the growth of data formats and representations.

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