Lu Jingtai: regional medical information sharing platform as a foothold of large data

The era of large data is coming. Does medical agencies has prepared for large data? What influence does large data exert on medical informatization? Does idea and technology could adapt to Chinese medical field? What values can idea and technology realize for medical agencies? Lu Jingtai who is a director of information center in General Hospital of The Second Artillery Corps describes large data in his eyes and brings us a new revelation.

Information resources sharing, regional medical as a foothold of large data

Large data is defined as data that its size exceeds conventional data size. With the deep development of medical informatization, most people think it right that the medical data of rapid increase could be classified into large data. However, Lu Jingtai explains that the very enormous data of over PB level could be considered as large data. Thus, our hospital data is not large data at present. The regional medical is the only foothold of large data in China. Only when we establish the regional medical successfully, the sharing data of all tertiary hospitals could achieve the level of large data. Take Beijing for example, there are nearly 70 tertiary hospitals in Beijing. If the data of every tertiary hospital is joined together into a data center, data in data center is large data.

The United States government has established a regional medical data sharing platform by commercial insurance. In USA, government doesn't intervene in hospitals' decisions, but just gives some advice. The medical care system in USA is more perfect than that in China. The payment of single sickness is carried out in USA, thereby to attract the investment of commercial insurance on offering a uniform standard data interface for all the hospitals. Data could be exchanged among hospitals. The hospitals could request patients' data in other hospitals, thereby to understand clinical treatment of patients in other hospitals.

Data centralized management has many advantages. However, Lu Jingtai believes that the United States government doesn't expect to realize centralized sharing of all the data from its past experience. Because most hospitals in USA are private hospitals. Except that military hospitals could realize unified management, other governmental hospitals don't have enough abilities to achieve data centralized sharing. Thus, it is surprising to understand how regional medical is manipulated in USA.

“In fact, from medical point of view, the data centralized sharing is not completely realized in USA. Realizing regional medical is intended to achieve data sharing and uniform standard data interface. These will be favorable to access data among hospitals.”

Large data is another subversive reform of information technology and greatly increases way of showing data. The development of large data in medical field makes it possible for military hospitals to transform construction of information system into data processing application.

The construction of the integration of medical card is being actively carried out in hundreds of military hospitals previously. By constructing integration of medical card, clinical data could be accessed remotely. When a patient goes to hospitals in place other than his or her own hometown, physicians could examine the previous medical records of the patient by remotely requesting hospitals in his or her own hometown medical records, which greatly increases patients' curative ratio and satisfaction and reliability of service.

A t present, nearly 50 hospitals has realized clinical data sharing. The centralized sharing of electronic medical records is purpose will be fully realized in 2015 as planned.

Additionally, reasonable utilization is the final purpose of large data. It doesn't have any value if data collected is kept in mothballs. The critical problem for hospitals is how to use large data to perform feasibility analysis and guide work.

Chinese difficulty still exists and large data needs guide of government.

The realization of regional medical data sharing could achieve very enormous value. However, does medical agencies has prepared for large data? What is the most eager expectation of CIOs in hospitals for their departments in charge? Of course, it is standard.

“Regional medical means sharing of the previous medical information among hospitals. It is necessary for our country to establish standards and realize uniform interfaces in the further regional medical. Only in this way can the application of regional medical be more convenient.”

At present the information is isolated of all the medical and health institutions. Moreover, these medical and health institutions lacks a uniform data exchange standard, network information platform and corresponding policies. Thus, it is very meaningful to construct a region-based data sharing platform under these circumstances.

The competent administrative department for health usually relies on clinical data to understand the average cost of the patients, analyze disease and investigates epidemic diseases, their pathogenesis and distribution of patients' age. Only large data could be more convenient to perform these researches. However, if we want to realize integration of medical data in all the hospitals in Beijing, any medical institution could not make it come true, but government (Beijing health bureau) could make it possible. Furthermore, data exchange standard is constructed on the basis of sharing data in all hospitals relying on data exchange platform. By applying the standards, we could perform unified management of “data acquisition, transmission, analysis and application”, further to analyze medical trends in certain area. Of course, this also facilitates management reform of government.

From the beginning of this year, National Health and Family Planning Commission will publish a series of policies to support construction of regional medical and add more investment on regional medical.

These exists a big difference in application of regional medical between America and China. American government doesn't give advice but publishes some preferential policies to hospitals. However, the application of regional medical is guided by Chinese government. Overall, regional medical still has a long way to success. Thus, we can't apply American experiences mechanically and should make some innovation in system of organization.

Lu Jingtai thinks that the medical mode in which small hospitals copy large hospitals is an effective way of realizing data sharing during construction of hospital informationization. By this medical mode, tertiary hospitals could promote common development of secondary hospitals and community hospitals. However, the medical mode isn't the best medical mode. Take General Hospital of The Second Artillery Corps and its subsidiary hospitals as an example, the best medical mode is that all the data is stored in information platform of General Hospital of The Second Artillery Corps and a proprietary network line allocated to its subsidiary hospitals, thereby to realize medical information sharing. Meanwhile, community hospitals could enhance their own medical abilities, increase accessibility of medical services, reduce medical costs and risks and best utilize sharing advantage by connecting with information sharing platform.

Large data isn't an illusion, indicating bright prospects

Could computing is controversial at the beginning of proposing the concept. Like cloud computing, large data is considered to be irrational and a soap bubble. However, Lu Jingtai doesn't think so. He believes that as long as there is informatization among industries, the amount of data should increase. When the increase achieves a certain degree, large data is formed. This process won't take a long time.

At present, the amount of data of hospitals is still far away from large data. Furthermore, it is impossible to form large data in a hospital or certain hospital. However, the whole medical industry could make it come true. Lu Jingtai believes that as soon as medical departments has enough measures and perfect mechanism,medical data could soon realize resources sharing in the next three to five years.

Finally, Lu Jingtai tells reporters that he is studying in a medical class of CIO in Peking University. Large data is a hot topic and will be used and developed in future medical industry. The era of large data is a gradual process. Thus, we should take an enthusiastic attitude towards the gradual process of large data.