In the health care space these words are now frequently used, but how much of this is hype rather than reality? What are the implications for patient privacy, informed consent, liability, intellectual property, and discrimination? How will the medical profession and the patient experience change as these buzzwords become the new standard of care?
Many dream of a true “learning health system.” In such a system data are collected routinely in the process of care, with the explicit aim that those data be used for the purpose of analyzing and improving care. Just as data are continuously collected, they are continuously analyzed to reveal patterns in the process of care, procedures that can be improved, and other underlying patterns such as differential patient response to different treatments. If this is to be our future, how can bioethics and law steer us towards a future where technology serves as our ideals rather than (mis)shapes them? |
