Healthcare innovation: Shaping the future with data

In today’s rapidly evolving healthcare landscape, reliable data is a crucial driver of progress and innovation. Valid, accessible, and securely managed data forms the foundation for transformative solutions that positively impact patients, providers, and the entire industry. By implementing comprehensive data strategies, healthcare organizations can accelerate digital transformation and groundbreaking discoveries, significantly improve patient outcomes and healthcare quality, enhance provider satisfaction, and optimize overall business operations. This creates a future where innovation truly serves all.

I recently moderated an industry solution speaking session on “Healthcare Innovation: Shaping the Future with Data” at HIMSS24. I was joined by Dr. Rowland Illing, Chief Medical Officer and Director of Global Healthcare and Nonprofits at Amazon Web Services (AWS). The panel also included experts from Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center, AdaptX, and Presidio. During this session, panelists shared their challenges and insights on healthcare innovation and digital transformation. This post highlights the key takeaways from that session, including excerpts from the examples shared, and the Q&A discussion.

The power of reliable data

One of the key takeaways from the panel was the importance of reliable data as the foundation for transformative solutions. Dr. Illing emphasized AWS’ healthcare and life science mission and framework, which centers around clean, accessible, and secure data management. By ensuring the integrity and accessibility of data from the very beginning, healthcare organizations can unlock its full potential and drive meaningful change.

Michael Zager, Founder and Director of Data Core at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center, stressed the criticality of capturing all relevant information about data, stating, “If you’ve worked in research, if you’ve looked at this data, you know how important it is to capture all of the information about that data—what type of machine was it on? Was it frozen? How long was it frozen?” This attention to detail, he argued, is crucial for building large corpuses of data that can be used to feed into models and drive innovation.

Accelerating insights and innovation

The panelists unanimously agreed that harnessing the power of data is crucial for accelerating insights and innovation in healthcare. By using advanced analytics, machine learning (ML), and artificial intelligence (AI), healthcare providers can uncover patterns, predict outcomes, and help clinicians and researchers make faster data-driven decisions that benefit patients. Michael Zager shared the experience of Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center in utilizing data to accelerate breakthroughs in cancer research, demonstrating the transformative potential of data-driven approaches.

Empowering better patient care

Dr. Lynn Martin, Chief Medical Officer for Pediatric and Academic Services at AdaptX, shared a compelling example of how removing the siloes that slow access to data empowered clinicians to make significant changes in their practice. By providing direct, self-service access to performance data, his team rapidly accelerated their rate of improvement from one project every 18 months to one every three months. This transformation led to a remarkable achievement: a 100 percent opioid-free ambulatory surgery center, with the data sharing and governance framework spreading to other practices within the hospital.

Embracing a “what if” approach

Rob Kim, Chief Technology Officer at Presidio, highlighted the importance of embracing a “what if” approach and thinking outside the box when it comes to healthcare innovation. He encouraged nontechnical people to become literate in the capabilities of technology and how they empower clinicians and researchers to “dream crazy” when envisioning potential solutions. For data practitioners, Rob stressed the need to modernize data governance approaches and adopt modern lake house patterns and architectures. In each case, AWS Marketplace simplifies and accelerates modernization with software you know and trust, streamlined procurement, improved controls, optimized IT spend, and professional support, all in one place.

About AWS Marketplace and next steps

AWS Marketplace is a digital catalog of third-party software services and data that makes it easy for healthcare organizations to find, buy, deploy, and manage purpose-built software on AWS. With AWS Marketplace, you can unlock innovation with access to thousands of software listings, improve software governance, streamline approvals, and spend visibility.

Research from Forrester estimates it takes half the time to find, buy, and deploy solutions through AWS Marketplace compared to other channels.

Leveraging purpose-built solutions

The panelists highlighted the role of purpose-built solutions, such as those available in AWS Marketplace, in driving healthcare innovation. These solutions, tailored specifically for healthcare and life science applications, can help organizations overcome common challenges, such as data silos, interoperability issues, and regulatory compliance. By using these purpose-built tools, healthcare providers can accelerate their innovation journey and unlock the full potential of their data.

AdaptX – Dr. Martin’s team faced challenges with high costs and convincing multiple parties to participate in data collection and sharing. They leveraged AWS Marketplace to innovate reducing anesthesia-related greenhouse gas emissions. AWS Marketplace provided economies of scale, lowering entry costs for participating centers and turning initial rejections into approvals.

The solution offered a standardized data-sharing environment, enabling centers to collaborate effectively. The result: a 10x return on investment through reduced anesthesia gas purchases. AWS Marketplace helped overcome financial barriers, enhanced data sharing, and drove substantial environmental and cost-saving benefits.

Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center – Michael Zager shared that they are transitioning from being a customer of AWS Marketplace to becoming a solution provider. The complexity of their architecture and various deployment constraints motivated this move. AWS Marketplace offers easy onboarding for customers, vendor insights for security attestations, simplified cost recovery and administration, and a streamlined procurement process.

Presidio – Rob Kim highlighted that AWS Marketplace enables a consumption-based model for Presidio’s healthcare customers, allowing them to easily turn services on and off as needed. It also allows Presidio to identify unique value-adds they can provide on top of vendor and partner solutions. Additionally, AWS Marketplace helps Presidio’s healthcare affiliates address cybersecurity insurance challenges by providing solutions that ensure recoverability.

Next steps

Visit Healthcare solutions in AWS Marketplace to learn more about the solutions available in AWS Marketplace.

To learn more about the topics discussed in this post or discover additional insights from the Q&A session, watch the HIMSS24 Session: Healthcare innovation – Shaping the future with data, available on demand.

About the author

Josh Weatherly is the Global Director of Public Sector Industry Partnerships and Go-to-Market for AWS Marketplace. He is responsible for leading channel development of software and consulting partners providing innovative cloud solutions through the AWS Partner Network (APN) and AWS Marketplace. In this role, he is focused on serving healthcare, education, government, aerospace and satellite, and not-for-profit customers. Prior to joining AWS, Josh served in multiple global leadership roles at Dell, including general manager, focused on global outsourcing and enterprise transformation. During his tenure, he led global teams to help customers develop and implement innovative strategies for growth while removing complexity and cost from their technology investments.