The Biggest ‘Big Data’ of ‘IoT’ is in ‘Population Health’

Catchy title? - Sure thing. I deliberately used the buzzwords of the moment and even went the extra mile: I combined 3 of them in the same short sentence. All to serve the ironic purpose of hypes and Health IT-cannibalism.

I’ve been in health IT for more than 23 years, worked and lived in 5 continents and have been in direct, close contact with many, many ‘smart’ vendors, analysts and anyone selling 'stuff' in the industry. Whereby smart doesn’t necessarily rhyme with ‘value-adding’. I have seen the wildest hypes and buzzwords used all over the place by a ton of people and the corporations behind them trying to catch the wave for a free surfing session. The latest ones being: Big Data, Internet of Things (IoT), Population Health and now increasingly ‘uberization’ of healthcare

So here are a few thoughts to stir some reaction and get some discussion going. I’ll try my best to hide any irony. All characters are fictional :)

Big Data: 

There’s no other industry than healthcare that is as full of and as hungry for data at the same time. Using the word ‘big data’ in healthcare is an oxymoron. A more pragmatic ‘terminology' would be to come up with practical, well-researched and peer-validated use cases and solutions using the principles of big data to solve significant healthcare equations - and give them proper names, not a shadow dress. Anything else is verbal marketing diarrhea.

Internet of Things: 

Really? what a far-fetched name to simply say ‘aggregating data’! Isn’t it what we’ve been doing in health IT in the last 20 years or so? - Does the shoveling of new data coming from new sources, combined with the cloud hype justify the fancy name? - Not for me, but apparently it justifies some people’s salaries. Keep waxing your surfboards and beware of sharks guys. 

Population Health: 

Right, so what’s the new definition of 'public healthcare' again?

Uberizing Health:

I get the hives on this one. Can’t control it. Why? -well, if uber is about maximizing the output of underutilized, non-owned resources then one should keep in mind that the most underutilized resource in healthcare is…? - you got it: The patient. We’ve been talking about educating, enabling and empowering patients and their families for decades, especially the ones with chronic conditions. There is a wide array of good initiatives underway and successful ones which have been there for many years before Uber learned to crawl. So please guys, give them all a break and go to work.

There will always be a big difference between true innovators-entrepreneurs and the ones who just invent a new jargon for things that have existed forever. My problem with the latter is they create more confusion, wrong hypes and waste of other people’s energy, instead of helping to solve existing problems.