Nashville may be known for torchy twang, but the city also boasts a robust healthcare scene that’s music to tech innovators’ ears. That includes legacy companies, as well as a variety of other, newer providers that run the healthcare gamut from direct behavioral health, specialty medicine and acute patient care to online and app-based services and support. That’s why it made sense for CHiME and hlth to hold ViVE, a tech-oriented in event now in its second year, in Music City.
The muti-day event focused on healthcare solutions of all types, from consumer-facing apps to back-end services and support. It also featured multiple stages with short-bite presentations as well as roundtables, tackling a variety of on-brand topics such as easing consumer access to drugs (Amazon Pharmacy debuted its new coupons feature for branded medications), the always-hot area of data security, how to achieve operational (vs. clinical) improvements via data usage, and the evolving (and often overused) term “AI.”
There were plenty of breakout sessions as well, including a kickoff roundtable, Taking Action on Data, sponsored by the Nashville Healthcare Council (which has more than 300 member organizations) that set the tone and framed out many issues that experts would tackle in the coming days. For instance, one panelist noted, consumers tap their phone to pay for a prescription at the drugstore but are still required to fill out a clipboard and provide personal identifying information multiple times while seeking medical treatment.
“Healthcare is a data-rich, information poor industry,” said Marty Bonick, President and CEO of Ardent Health Services. “It is an industry that is late to the process of capturing data electronically, and then turning that into useful, actionable information.”
The goal, added Edmund Jackson, CEO of UnityAI, who spent 10 years at HCA as Chief Data Officer, is to create the systems that operate in the background, analyzing and sorting data and then feeding what’s needed to clinicians as they provide treatment. Analysis, analytics and all the rest would be running in the background, which would also guide predictive models, panelists added, while also making sure to point out that the increasing use of data to drive decisions wouldn’t negate or diminish human interaction.
Where to mine data, how to share and store it, and what to do with it dominated the show-floor conversations as well. As a sign of continuing evolution in the space, almost as many attendees decried the use of buzzy words and phrases like “interoperability” and “AI-driven” as those who had those same concepts shouting across their displays and marketing collateral.
Generalities aside, it’s hard to say where the next evolution in healthcare data will occur. Point-of-care concepts get a lot of attention, but ViVE also had plenty of exhibitors discussing using data for physician recruitment and a host of other uses to support business and operational goals beyond patient care. It’s an interesting (and fast-moving) time to be in the business of helping healthcare providers get, and deploy, the information they need to achieve all their goals.