This week in health IT: HIMSS14 aftermath

Whew! HIMSS14 was a big conference with much to see in the exhibit hall and much to learn through a broad range of general education sessions, keynote addresses and symposia. I hope you followed our extensive coverage. If not, please peruse the news anytime by visiting our website.

There was, of course, much emphasis on federal mandates with ICD-10 and Meaningful Use Stage 2 deadlines looming. However, I noticed a lot of speakers focusing on all the waste in our healthcare system.

“We spend a lot of money on care that is preventable and avoidable,” said Peter Preziosi, PhD, RN, healthcare innovation strategist at Verizon, speaking on mobile health trends at the Nursing Informatics Symposium.

Mobile health and telehealth could help save the global industry about $250 billion by improving access and helping consumers better manage their diseases and overall wellness, he said. In the meantime, the market is booming, with $10.6 billion in U.S. revenue for remote patient monitoring systems in 2012 calculated to grow to $21 billion in 2017. Likewise, U.S. telemedicine revenue is expected to grow at a continuous annual growth rate of 18.5 percent from 2012 to 2018.

“The success of telehealth and telemedicine will grow even more as tools grow,” said Preziosi.

These tools need to address several factors to succeed, he said, including reliable connectivity, the ability to integrate and interoperate biometric devices as needed, user relevance to their lifestyle, gaming techniques to make it fun and enjoyable, and predictive analytics to synthesize data into usable and actionable displays.

“This is the holy grail of where we need to go," he said. "We’re not really there yet. It’s a great time to get involved with helping structure these systems."

This is just one area in which it will be very interesting to see how things progress and how quickly.

Beth Walsh

Clinical Innovation + Technology editor