We've come a long way with modern medicine early detection, new drugs and improved patient care have led to significantly better treatment outcomes. And yet, we are at the cusp of a perfect storm about to transform healthcare as we know it - the confluence of wearable health devices, social media and big data analytics. The focus is shifting from a reactive, treatment-based care delivery approach to a proactive, data driven, overall wellness objective. The future seems to be much more about coaching individual consumers on making informed decisions for better lifestyles through personalized data analytics; and much less about diagnosing ailments and prescribing remedies for patients.
The opportunity and potential for change is enormous, and poses an equally imposing leadership challenge for those in healthcare IT to enable this transformation. How appropriate that we're celebrating National Health IT Week (#NHITweek) in the context of the macro issues facing the industry:
Healthcare consumer mission focus: Very simply, this is about putting the consumer at the core of care delivery. Delivering personalized data and insights and engaging the consumer requires integrating disparate systems, exchanging data across platforms and implementing predictive analytics. Is your organization's IT infrastructure capable of enabling this?
Exponential data growth: Every healthcare IT organization is dealing with significant growth in information-both in sheer volumes, and in the variety of data types and applications. As wearable devices and smart sensors become mainstream, the data growth will easily dwarf current rates. Are you ready for storing, managing and protecting this data tsunami?
Business model changes: This mass customization of care delivery requires new economic models and a move away from transaction based billing and accounting to an actuarial approach using expected life-time value of consumer outcomes. Can your IT architecture and budget scale smoothly to account for the variability inherent in these economic models?
If you're a healthcare IT leader, and these issues seem overwhelming - you need to think like a hedgehog! As Jim Collins explains in his best selling book - great leaders understand their core competence, know what they're passionate about and find the economically viable path that allows them to apply both.
I'll assume that you're passionate about better consumer healthcare outcomes. Pursuing this passion in an economically viable way requires you to stop doing activities that are not core to this pursuit, and to make conscious choices about lumpy capital investments as well as focusing your teams on the right priorities.
So what do data centers have to do with all this? If you're like most healthcare organizations, you probably maintain an internal data center. And like most IT leaders in your situation, you also know that running your own data center is a thankless job - you get called out for any outages, but you get no credit for keeping it running the rest of the time. And who hasn't been hit with the unexpected capital request for an infrastructure upgrade when you were least expecting it?
This is a great example to the apply the hedgehog test: is running an internal data center your core competence? Can you quickly add capacity or scale your footprint without significant budget and TCO impact? Is data center management the optimal use of your people and resources relative to your organization's mission? If you answered no to these questions, you should consider alternatives such as outsourcing your data center to a colocation facility.
In fact, many healthcare IT leaders are increasingly comfortable using leading outsourcing vendors in the data center colocation market. Talk about having your cake and eating it too - which is exactly the right prescription for a happy hedgehog!
Follow this week's conversation about the value of Healthcare IT at #NHITweek.
Most recent headlines
01/01/2026
Latin Grammy Cultural Foundation Announces 2026 Noel Schajris Scholarship The scholarship will cover tuition and housing for one Berklee College of Music stud...
01/01/2026
New year, new games, all with RTX 5080-powered cloud energy. GeForce NOW is kicking off 2026 by looking back at an unforgettable year of wins and wildly high fr...
31/12/2025
Back to All News
NFL Christmas Gameday on Netflix Scores Again With the Lions-V...
30/12/2025
As the College Football Playoff Enters the Quarterfinals, ESPN Blows Out Its Meg...
30/12/2025
SVG's Best of 2025: Original ArticlesTake a look back at all our coverage of big-time productions, game-changing technologies, and state-of-the-art new faci...
30/12/2025
MELBOURNE, Fla., Dec. 30, 2025 - L3Harris Technologies (NYSE: LHX) will release its fourth quarter 2025 financial results before the market opens on Thursday, J...
30/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
30/12/2025
It marked the first civilian operational authorization for a HAPS flight in Europe, led by Space42's subsidiary, Mira Aerospace
The flight demonstrated HAP...
29/12/2025
San Francisco 49ers Strike Gold With Halftime Laser SpectacularStunning display caps $200 million renovation of Levi's Stadium techBy Dan Daley, Audio Edito...
29/12/2025
The Cup's Around the Corner: An Inside Look at Broadcast Preparations for th...
29/12/2025
SVG's Best of 2025: Longform VideoWatch the standout keynote conversations, deep dives, and panel discussions from the year for free on SVG PLAY!By Brandon ...
29/12/2025
From crisper Lossless audio and immersive music videos in beta to new Audiobooks+ plans, custom transitions between tracks, and in-app Messages, we keep levelin...
29/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
27/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
26/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
26/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
25/12/2025
Holiday lights are twinkling, hot cocoa's on the stove and gamers are settling in for a well-earned break.
Whether staying in or heading on a winter getawa...
24/12/2025
What is AI good for? Posted by MTI Film on December 24, 2025
What is AI good for?
What is AI good for?
It's been three years since ChatGPT first cap...
24/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
24/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
24/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
24/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
24/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
24/12/2025
Back to All News
The Boyfriend' Season 2 Unveils Heartwarming Trailer, Key...
24/12/2025
Back to All News
Love, Fights, and Everything in Between: Badly in Love' Returns for Season 2
Entertainment
24 December 2025
GlobalJapan
Link copied t...
24/12/2025
Scripps Research study links sleep variability with sleep apnea and hypertension How consumers' digital activity trackers could enable personalized health s...
23/12/2025
How guilas Cibae as Dominican Winter League Games Are Locally Produced for Glob...
23/12/2025
BitFire's Jim Akimchuk on Supplying Scalability and Customization in the Clo...
23/12/2025
CAMB.AI Enables European Athletics to Offer Multi-Language SupportPlan is to eventually offer translation into all languages spoken in EuropeBy Ken Kerschbaumer...
23/12/2025
Analysis: As sports media values trend negative, scarcity and quality are king By Callum McCarthy, Editor-at-Large
Monday, December 22, 2025 - 14:08
Print ...
23/12/2025
ESPN, Disney, and NBA Return to the Animated Altcast Fray With Second Edition of...
23/12/2025
End the Year on a High Note and Donate to the Sports Broadcasting Fund Today!By Ken Kerschbaumer, Editorial Director
Tuesday, December 23, 2025 - 12:25 pm
P...
23/12/2025
The year is winding down, the weather outside is frightful, and it's the perfect time to escape into a story that warms the heart. For listeners looking for...
23/12/2025
A Zeus motor is hot fire tested at L3Harris' Camden, Arkansas, solid rocket ...
23/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
23/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
23/12/2025
Lightware will exhibit several major product innovations at ISE 2026, including the new USB-C BOOSTER-V1, Google Meet. integration for various Taurus UCX models...
23/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
23/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
23/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
23/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
23/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
23/12/2025
Taking the Stage at Carnegie Hall-On a Global Scale Boston Conservatory Orchestra students reflect on their epic concert marking the 80th session of the UN Gene...
23/12/2025
Back to All News
Netflix's The Great Flood and Culinary Class Wars 2 Top Gl...
23/12/2025
Back to All News
Stranger Things By the Numbers: How the Global Phenomenon Shap...
23/12/2025
Experience the power of WO Automation for Radio's newest service, the System Effectiveness Review. Designed to help you achieve more, a System Effectiveness...
23/12/2025
23 Dec 2025
VEON's Beeline Kazakhstan and Rakuten Symphony Collaborate to A...
23/12/2025
Back to All News
How Steamy Can It Get? Single's Inferno' Season 5 Pre...
23/12/2025
Back to All News
33 Million Global Viewers on Netflix Watched Jake Paul vs. Ant...
We've come a long way with modern medicine early detection, new drugs and improved patient care have led to significantly better treatment outcomes. And yet, we are at the cusp of a perfect storm about to transform healthcare as we know it - the confluence of wearable health devices, social media and big data analytics. The focus is shifting from a reactive, treatment-based care delivery approach to a proactive, data driven, overall wellness objective. The future seems to be much more about coaching individual consumers on making informed decisions for better lifestyles through personalized data analytics; and much less about diagnosing ailments and prescribing remedies for patients.
