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christine_donato
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In a newly released Oxford Economics study, over two-thirds of survey respondents say personalized medicine is already having a measurable effect on patient outcomes.

Today, during the first day of HIMSS 2016, many different healthcare organizations shared how personalized medicine is making an impact on their patients. These organizations have successfully transitioned from disparate systems with disparate data to unified and optimized centralized data centers.

Mercy

First to speak at SAP Booth 5828 on Tuesday of HIMSS was Mercy.

Here's a comprehensive podcast featuring Mercy recorded at the event.

Curtis Dudley, VP of Performance Solutions at Mercy spoke to the organization's results, massive cultural change, and use of perioperative services to reduce variability and costs.

With its Information Portal that runs on SAP, Mercy is able to access over 40 million records in real time.  The organization can dive into detailed information, self discover data, and most importantly, identify cost inefficiencies and put a stop to expensive and unnecessary practices.


Dudley shared an example saying that in one case, a doctor noticed that his execution of a certain procedure far exceeded the cost of other physicians performing the same surgery.  But by having the ability to deep dive into information from many different sources, the doctor was able to easily see that he was using a more expensive and unnecessary tool to perform the operation.


Here's a slide summarizing the annual cost reductions that Mercy achieved by using SAP BusinessObjects and SAP HANA to pull actionable, detailed insights:

MemorialCare

Next up to present in SAP Booth 5828 was MemorialCare Executive Director of Data Strategy, Dan Exley.


SAP HANA has changed the way MemorialCare employees work.  The organization's former reporting process is diminishing because the performance of SAP HANA allows them to see data that doesn't need to be pre-coordinated. MemorialCare has completely transformed its reporting processes.

Previously, the organization ran a flat overnight report that would run for hours.  In the morning, a two-page static report would be delivered.  Now, with SAP HANA, the organization is saving nine to ten hours of clock time because they have the ability to pull any data desired with the click of a "show me" button on the SAP HANA Platform.  The user can choose what they want to see and in what level of detail.

Now MemorialCare refers to their report writers as analytic developers because all of the data transformation occurs in real time, virtually through SAP HANA.

These analytic developers can sit with physicians and pull the information needed on a patient in real time, helping to make faster and better care decisions.

What once took weeks or months now takes only a few days or hours.


MemorialCare is one of 30 SAP customers that uses SAP HANA to consolidate and streamline data from Epic EHR systems.  Through this large community of SAP and Epic users, companies can collaborate, help each other, and share best practices.

Here's a podcast recorded with MemorialCare today.

ASCO

Later in the day, the American Society of Clinical Oncologists (ASCO) presented and explained that the organization is fully running its first round of practices on its CancerLinQ platform. CancerLinQ runs on SAP HANA and is helping to oncologists from around the US comprehend the billions of data sets that exist in clinical oncology.

As Rich Ross, Chief Solutions Officer at ASCO explained in his late afternoon session, only 3% of cancer patients are enrolled in clinical trials, and unfortunately, these participants don't accurately represent the large majority of cancer patients. Clinical trial patients tend to be less diverse, healthier, and younger than the majority of patients.

Therefore, 97% of the data that exists on oncology is locked away in files and servers. ASCO's CancerLinQ platform hopes to unleash that information and enable physicians to pull actionable insights from it.

As of last month, the first round of patient EHR information from certain large hospital systems was fully loaded into CancerLinQ.  ASCO expects to see significant results in 2016 and beyond from this first trial.

SAP Health Engagement

The last SAP session today was presented by Dinesh Vandayar, VP SAP, Personalized Medicine, and Stephan Schindewolf, Chief Product Expert, SAP, Personalized Medicine.  The two men went into detail about SAP's mission to create a health network that enables personalized medicine.

Vandayar touched on the many entities that exist within the healthcare industry, and how, unfortunately, these entities do not currently communicate with each other.

The new SAP Medical Research Insights Solution and the new SAP Foundation for Health Solution work to connect all of the disconnected entities into a single data entity with a comprehensive and connected data network.  The aim is to connect the consumer/patient to wearable devices to mobile apps to the physician to researchers to program managers.  SAP hopes to connect all pieces of the cycle helping to provide a truly personalized care model.

Here's a 1-slider summarizing SAP Health Enagements:

As the Oxford Economics study reports, organizations are still learning how to share data and interact with newly empowered patients.  Technology is at the heart of personalized medicine, and substantial investments are being made in Big Data analytics.  Building out the proper IT capabilities. like that of Mercy, MemorialCare, and ASCO, is an essential step in the process.

For live tweet updates at #HIMSS16, follow me on Twitter @CMDonato.