According to a 2013 study from Oracle, healthcare providers lose on average $70.2 million annually, or 15% of
additional revenue per hospital due to their failure to fully leverage the
information they collect[1]. The volume of healthcare data (from CRM,
Electronic Medical Records, labs, billing, etc.) is humongous but ‘information’
is less.
Currently, about one-third of the approximately 5000
hospitals in the United States are operating at a loss and another third are
just breaking even. Is this an indicator of poor financial health of the
healthcare industry? To an extent, yes. However, healthcare organizations are
undergoing a data revolution. They are adopting innovative techniques in order
to stay ahead in the stiff competition. Although many organizations had recognized
the importance of intelligent systems to aid in decision making many years ago,
they have now begun to utilize the true power of Business Intelligence!
Why healthcare BI?
BI enables a healthcare organization to:
- Analyze operational data of hospitals
- Evaluate the operations against best practices in the industry
- Improve patient treatment and care
- Make well-informed decisions and provide predictive analytics
- Analyze decisions made in the past to make the necessary operational adjustments
Three significant categories of data for a healthcare
organization are: operational, clinical and financial. A DW/BI system captures
all of these data in one view to provide a single version of truth. It helps an
organization in converting data to information by providing reports and
dashboards. This in turn leads to increased effectiveness of operations,
increased revenue and decreased expenses, and better quality of service. It also
helps in reaching goals and establishing an edge over competitors by providing
crucial business insights.
Healthcare
DW/BI system Architecture
The above figure shows the process flow of an Enterprise Healthcare
DW/BI system.
While designing such a system, some of the Key Performance
Indicators (KPIs) [4] to be addressed are:
- Patient Care KPI - Patient wait time during admission, service timeliness, complaints, etc.
- Clinical Data KPI - Cost effectiveness, in-patient admission rates, response time, etc.
- Financial KPI - Net income, operating margin, capital expenses (%), etc.
BI Adoption
Challenges
Initial investment and budget allocation to a BI
implementation project is a big obstacle. The one-time upfront costs which could
be millions of dollars and the operational costs need to be carefully
evaluated. Only a BI plan which involves generating significant tangible monetary
returns can do justice to the huge investment. Some of the other key challenges
of adopting BI in a healthcare establishment are:
- Heterogeneity and complexity of existing IT systems: Each health department will have its own type of IT systems and will vary in its operational methodologies.
- Resource shortage: The supply of expert BI Analysts and Implementation Consultants does not meet the overwhelming demand for precise decision making in the healthcare industry.
- Complex data: Capturing and analyzing data involving many-to-many relationships between several entities can be challenging.
The process of adopting BI to create business value begins
with defining a BI strategy and roadmap, and then creating the most suitable
solution. BI is becoming an essential part of any organization. A healthcare BI
solution should be designed by keeping two things in mind - creating immediate
business value and providing flexibility to future needs.
References:
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