Unleashing the Power of Digital Health: The Vital Role of Interoperability
In an era where digital technology permeates every aspect of our lives, the healthcare sector is no exception. Electronic medical records, mobile health apps, medical imaging, low-cost gene sequencing, and innovative sensors and wearable devices generate an unprecedented volume of digital health data. When harnessed with artificial intelligence (AI), cloud computing, and big data analytics, this data holds immense potential to revolutionize healthcare. Improved diagnostics, personalized treatments, and early disease prevention are just the tip of the iceberg in terms of benefits for millions of patients worldwide.
However, the true value of medical data is realized only when it is transformed into meaningful information. Achieving this transformation necessitates high-quality datasets, seamless communication across IT systems, and standardized data formats that both humans and machines can process. Unfortunately, much of today's medical data remains trapped in isolated silos and incompatible systems, rendering it difficult to exchange, process, and interpret. The current medical landscape is characterized more by disconnected small data than by integrated big data, posing significant obstacles to data-driven medical innovations. Unlocking the full potential of digital medicine requires an interconnected data infrastructure with reliable and secure interfaces, international standards for data exchange, and clear medical terminologies. In essence, digital health hinges on interoperability.
The Imperative of Interoperability in Digital Health
Despite the increasing acknowledgment of the importance of interoperable health IT systems, awareness among healthcare professionals remains relatively low compared to other digital health drivers like AI, big data, or mobile technologies. This lack of awareness contributes to slow progress in health interoperability. Yet, interoperability is indispensable for digital health advancements and is a prerequisite for the innovations envisioned for future medicine.
This article explores the critical importance of interoperability in realizing the full potential of digital health. We provide an overview of the different levels of interoperability: technical, syntactic, semantic, and organizational. We then illustrate how interoperability can enhance medicine in four key areas: AI and big data, medical communication, research, and international cooperation. These areas demonstrate how interoperability facilitates digital transformation and improves healthcare outcomes.
Levels of Interoperability
Technical Interoperability Technical interoperability ensures basic data exchange capabilities between systems, such as transferring data from a USB stick to a computer. This involves communication channels and protocols for data transmission. While achieving technical interoperability with today's digital networks is relatively straightforward, merely moving data is insufficient. Syntactic and semantic interoperability is required to process the data and extract meaningful information.
Syntactic Interoperability Syntactic interoperability specifies the format and structure of data, supported by international standards development organizations like Health Level Seven International (HL7) and Integrating the Healthcare Enterprise (IHE). Standards like HL7’s Fast Healthcare Interoperability Resources (FHIR) define common healthcare concepts and facilitate data exchange using modern web technologies. Initiatives like openEHR further support the structured exchange of health data, enabling the definition of clinical content through archetypes.
Semantic Interoperability Semantic interoperability involves medical terminologies, nomenclatures, and ontologies that ensure the shared meaning of medical concepts across systems. Terminologies like SNOMED CT, with over 340,000 medical concepts, provide a common language for medical terms. Domain-specific terminologies, such as LOINC for laboratory observations, complement general-purpose languages to advance semantic interoperability in medicine.
Organizational Interoperability At the highest level, interoperability involves organizations, legislations, and policies. The ultimate goal is to improve healthcare efficiency and patient outcomes through common business processes and workflows. This requires policies that incentivize and, if necessary, enforce interoperable data exchange.
Enhancing Medicine Through Interoperability
Interoperability for AI and Big Data AI and big data analytics rely on vast amounts of digital medical data from diverse sources. Interoperability allows for comprehensive data analysis across institutional boundaries, essential for applications in rare diseases, precision medicine, and pharmacogenomics. Standardized and structured data minimize errors and biases in AI algorithms, ensuring accurate and trustworthy analysis results.
Interoperability for Medical Communication Interoperable electronic health records (EHRs) facilitate seamless communication of medical information, improving patient care by providing healthcare providers with timely and relevant data. Interoperable EHRs also empower patients to manage their health more actively, transforming them into informed participants in their treatment.
Interoperability for Research Interoperability accelerates medical research by enabling the use of real-world data for large-scale observational studies and AI-driven analyses. Standardized data formats reduce the effort required for data cleaning and pre-processing, speeding up research and improving the quality and flexibility of analysis.
Interoperability for International Cooperation Standardized data formats and terminologies enable health data exchange across systems, institutions, and countries. This is crucial for global health challenges like pandemics and for research on rare diseases. Interoperable health IT systems also facilitate the international exchange of algorithms, applications, and technologies, democratizing access to advanced healthcare solutions.
Conclusion and Outlook
Digital medicine's potential is vast, but it depends on interoperable and standardized data. By fostering interoperability, we can unlock the full power of AI and big data, enhance medical communication, accelerate research, and improve international cooperation. Collaborative efforts from healthcare professionals, researchers, IT experts, data engineers, and policymakers are essential to make interoperability a prominent focus in medicine and healthcare. The rewards of such efforts will be substantial, paving the way for an interconnected digital health infrastructure that improves patient care and health outcomes globally.
At Swiftivity, we are committed to advancing interoperability in digital health, driving innovation, and ultimately enhancing the quality of care for patients worldwide.