New Health Trends Report

A proliferation of data is driving more democratization in health care, according to Stanford Medicine’s second annual Health Trends Report, published in December.

Building on 2017 findings about the changing role of data in medicine, the report explores how using and sharing data will transform research, medical practice and the role patients play in their care.

With the dramatic expansion of health care data, new technologies and industry players are taking medical knowledge from a human scale to a digital scale.

“Whole realms of expertise, previously siloed, are beginning to open up to more people in more places than ever before,” said Lloyd Minor, MD, dean of the School of Medicine.

The report evaluated existing research and publicly available data on health care sector trends, combined with insights from Stanford faculty and external health care experts. It identifies three pillars of influence:

• Intelligent computing — improved analytics in the artificial intelligence market will improve insights and provide a more precise, efficient, personalized and accessible health care system.

• Sharing — free-flowing information between stakeholders (patients, clinicians, insurers and technology providers) will ensure that the full benefit of collaboration is realized.

• Data security — a balance must be struck between innovation and safeguarding patient security, privacy and safety.

Link here to read the full report.