I read any story on healthcare reform with interest because the complexities and cost of reform will be significant.  One hopes that the benefits will be significant too, but that remains to be seen as reform is implemented.  I am also firmly convinced that technology will continue to change and improve the quality of care, while reducing the cost of care.  This combination is desperately needed, and integration will help us better manage change.

As mentioned in a recent Healthcare IT News article, “three forces are driving the transformation of the healthcare industry: regulatory reform is changing the industry structure, technology is creating a revolution in healthcare delivery and personalized medicine is disrupting the practice of medicine.”

Data is at the center of all of this change.  Reform will cause the healthcare industry to view patient data differently, and will require new connections that haven’t occurred in the past.  New, innovative connections between patient and doctor, and provider and insurer are already happening.  Where there are data and connections – there needs to be better integration.  Integration technology works behind the scenes and is critical to “make stuff happen” and to enable people or communities to connect with one another. 

These three transformational forces have caused healthcare providers to become even more concerned with coordinating and synchronizing results for their patients, for staffs and partners.  If everyone has one comprehensive view of patient data, for example, better care happens naturally with better communication and connectivity.  Mistakes are reduced, redundant tests are no longer needed, and entries of information go away.  In short, everyone’s on the same page.  I argue that this coordinated view is possible with better integration, and that integration doesn’t have to be difficult.  Incremental approaches to comprehensive integration can happen today. 

Integration provides connections between various disparate systems and applications to provide this single view of data.  Today, integration isn’t just about tracking and reporting on past events.  Real-time integration is about routing data based on the content of the data, applying rules to the data, causing things to happen based on the flow and content of information and how others react to the data.  On top of this dynamic mix of data and rules is a real-time view of data and the impact that data is having or showing on the enterprise.  Do I have enough inventory, staff, and information to make the right decisions?  If not, where do I go to get the information I need?    This one view of data helps organizations improve care, lower risk and increase revenue. 

The time to revisit integration is now.  Connected and synchronized healthcare data combined with the ability to manage it in real-time, will help healthcare organizations face reform, connect new technologies to old, and handle the future of healthcare, whether care happens in a hospital, clinic or at home. 

Technology has always made the seemingly impossible possible, and integration technology is no different.  In fact, while it’s addressing the “impossible,” integration technology also protects the investments you’ve already made and helps you adapt to reform and other mandates.  Integration technology is back in the limelight as the critical application to pull it all together, and the healthcare industry only stands to benefit from better integration.

With today being tax day in the U.S., many of us are focused on what we have paid in taxes, and what we get for our contributions. As our budget balloons to levels that some in both the White House and the Congressional Budget Office call unsustainable, many are thinking about how the country can lower healthcare costs (and therefore lower our collective tax burden). The question is how do we work to control the expansion of the U.S. budget while keeping a high level of care for patients? One answer is telemedicine.

Telemedicine offers a way for patients to use today’s technology to communicate with their doctors. Existing telemedicine communication tools include simple interfaces like phone, e-mail and fax. Newer tools include self-service healthcare websites and live video conferencing such as Skype or Google Wave. Telemedicine also includes home health, web-based medical decision support to self-diagnose, online PDR (physician desk reference), and direct interaction with remote medical resources via electronic collaboration tools. Armed with this technology and better information, patients take a more active role in their health. Care effectively shifts from a passive to a more proactive healthcare model.

Don’t forget that telemedicine isn’t about the technology, however. Technology is the enabling tool that allows patients to play a more active part in their healthcare. Telemedicine moves some patient care from traditional settings such as hospitals and clinics to that of the patient’s own home or location, saving us time and trips to the doctor. Today we are already using telemedicine tools such as phone, fax and email. But new more interactive self-service tools are being created all the time to help patients communicate with their healthcare providers easily and quickly, making us better informed and more in charge of our healthcare. Doctors use telemedicine to have access to the latest medical information available, and use aggregated data and baselines of care from a large collective of patients with the same health issue. This gives our doctors better information so they can provide us with the best care plans.

As access to telemedicine tools becomes more ubiquitous, patients will be able to communicate with their doctors on their iPhones, for example, no matter where either party may be located. In essence, telemedicine represents a patient revolution. It is on the path to becoming the leading way patients communicate with their doctors and doctors communicate with other healthcare providers to provide us with better care. Telemedicine holds promise for producing huge time and cost savings and improving care and outcome for patients. We can all benefit in the adoption of telemedicine, by the reduction in costs (which should help control the overall healthcare budget).

While telemedicine helps make patient care more convenient, effective and inexpensive, it cannot cure how we feel about paying taxes, unfortunately. But we can take solace in the fact that as telemedicine is adopted and becomes more common, it will help reduce healthcare costs, which should help reduce taxes for everyone.