CES 2018 Digital Health Focus: Sleep Wellness, Blockchain, Data Sharing, and Service Payment Models

At the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, medical data sharing, telemedicine, and healthcare billing models emerged as hot topics among experts.

CES Exhibition Site

At last week’s CES, many leading figures from the medical IT industry attended the event. While most focused on sleep health and wearable devices, numerous executives and entrepreneurs turned their attention to the biggest hurdle in healthcare—data management and analytics.

At the roundtable discussion of the “Digital Health Summit,” Pat Keran, Deputy Director of Innovation and R&D at Optum Technology, stated, “To effectively address data management and analytics, we must first cultivate a mindset of data sharing among individuals. In the healthcare sector, how can electronic medical records (EMR) be shared across various information systems? First, I personally believe that data sharing is paramount. However, achieving efficient analysis of existing data and integrating emerging artificial intelligence and deep learning technologies requires collaborative efforts from both technology companies and healthcare providers.”

As an increasing number of sensitive components (such as sensors) enter the medical field, how to separate useful data from noise and extract actionable information from acquired signals has become an urgent problem to be solved.

HumanaStefani Benefield, Vice President of Medical Innovation, stated at the same conference, “We should start considering caregivers. Before we achieve full data integration and interoperability, it is essential to ensure that data can be delivered in some manner to the patients under their care. Although we cannot yet leverage these data to formulate a perfect care plan, I believe we must place sufficient trust in researchers and caregivers to integrate new care protocols with patient treatment and evaluate their effectiveness. This approach will better facilitate the rapid development of the industry.”

Qu Harrison Terry, Marketing Director at Redox, is relatively new to the healthcare data sector. He expressed bewilderment at the current state of data silos and the industry’s excessive reliance on fax machines for transmitting medical data. To address this issue, his company offers a vendor-agnostic API platform, which is now used by hundreds of health organizations. He believes that overcoming barriers to data interoperability should be a key priority for the industry moving forward.

Humetrix CEO Bettina Experton discussed her company’s collaboration with government agencies over the past decade to launch the Blue Button initiative. Blue Button is a mobile app for iPhone called iBlueButton. The Blue Button symbol indicates that a website has the functionality to upload and download health records. Data from websites enabled with the Blue Button can be used to create portable medical records, facilitating communication among healthcare providers, caregivers, and other trusted individuals or entities.

Although barriers in the global healthcare market continue to multiply, Humetrix’s strong interest in the project ultimately enabled it to successfully introduce its products into the healthcare systems of the United Kingdom and France.

Bettina Experton stated in a speech, “We have transformed medical data into visible health records on smartphones. For years, we had hoped that the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) would provide us with an Application Programming Interface (API) to enable patients to easily access this data. CMS ultimately responded and approved this innovation, and today we are among the many organizations testing the API.”

At the conclusion of his speech, Experton also hinted that new CMS announcements regarding APIs would be released at the 2018 Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS) conference.

Of course,This conference could not be called a technology conference without mentioning blockchain.. During a fireside chat on future trends, Mike Jacobs, Senior Distinguished Engineer at Optum Health, and Jaquie Finn, Head of Digital Health at Cambridge Consultants, both expressed general optimism about the role of blockchain in healthcare, while also cautioning that it should be applied only to certain specific tasks.

Finn stated that if researchers are developing smart connected devices, he would consider recommending blockchain technology to clients in the following three scenarios:

1. The data is dynamic;

2. If the current solution is fragmented;

3. The data is suspected of malicious activity.

These three scenarios are well-suited for the application of blockchain technology; researchers can discuss and incorporate certain blockchain solutions during system design to safeguard data.

Finn stated that, to date, the most promising application of blockchain in healthcare he has observed is in designing systems to track and prevent the sale of counterfeit drugs and medical devices. Jacobs pointed out that Optum will play a leading role in the future intersection of blockchain and healthcare, believing that blockchain will have a profound impact in areas such as intelligent, legally binding automated contracts (smart contracts), and the storage and transmission of health records.

He pointed out: “Currently, in the healthcare sector, we face information silos characterized by high costs and irreconcilable disparities. The decentralization advocated by blockchain technology holds profound significance for addressing this issue.”

Digital health managers are deeply concerned about the impact of recent healthcare policies on their work. Participants have expressed strong concerns regarding the entrenched traditions of fee-for-service models and how these conventional payment structures affect the adoption of new medical technologies.

Zubin Eapen, Chief Medical Officer of CareMore Health, stated during a panel discussion: “Many countries are trapped in the fee-for-service model. They do not know how to utilize telemedicine or how to structure reimbursement for it. They fail to truly understand the rationale for adopting telemedicine, remaining accustomed to bringing patients back to hospitals or clinics, while overlooking that this is neither what patients want nor need.”

Most companies have responded positively to the impact of policies. Renna Pande, M.D., Chief Medical Officer at AbleTo, stated that certain government agencies have begun advocating for deregulation in specific medical areas, but some legislative bodies have disrupted certain reimbursement models, such as those for telemedicine.

Renna Pande remarked at the conference, “The innovation and creativity in Virginia are astonishing. There has been extensive media coverage of electronic medical records (EMR) in the state. Virginia began promoting EMR adoption 15 years ago, and this widespread implementation has lowered barriers to telemedicine delivery and facilitated providers in obtaining licensure in other states.”

Source: http://www.healthcareitnews.com