Benefits and challenges of Big Data in healthcare: an overview of the European initiatives

Abstract

Healthcare systems around the world are facing incredible challenges due to the ageing population and the related disability, and the increasing use of technologies and citizen’s expectations. Improving health outcomes while containing costs acts as a stumbling block. In this context, Big Data can help healthcare providers meet these goals in unprecedented ways. The potential of Big Data in healthcare relies on the ability to detect patterns and to turn high volumes of data into actionable knowledge for precision medicine and decision makers. In several contexts, the use of Big Data in healthcare is already offering solutions for the improvement of patient care and the generation of value in healthcare organizations. This approach requires, however, that all the relevant stakeholders collaborate and adapt the design and performance of their systems. They must build the technological infrastructure to house and converge the massive volume of healthcare data, and to invest in the human capital to guide citizens into this new frontier of human health and well-being. The present work reports an overview of best practice initiatives in Europe related to Big Data analytics in public health and oncology sectors, aimed to generate new knowledge, improve clinical care and streamline public health surveillance.

Emerging Wireless Sensor Networks and Internet of Things Technologies—Foundations of Smart Healthcare

“…In the PubMed database, within the same time slot, the number of papers increased from 25 to 350, as reported in Reference [85]. The abundance of research projects supported by the EU, systematized in Reference [84], confirms that big data presents many significant opportunities for healthcare innovation.…”

“…Recent surveys justify the growing big data implementation in medical systems. It was reported that the number of scientific papers on big data in healthcare follows a parabolic increase in the MEDLINE database-while no papers were reported in 2010, almost a thousand ones were found only eight years later [84]. In the PubMed database, within the same time slot, the number of papers increased from 25 to 350, as reported in Reference [85].…”

Population-based stroke surveillance using Big Data: epidemiological trends in admissions and mortality in Australia

“…"Big data" is enhanced with linkages between and across data-sets, allowing prospective individual-level analyses to measure post-discharge outcomes, including longer-term mortality. 7 We examined trends in stroke hospitalisations and survival, using routinely collected linked hospital admissions and mortality data within the context of an upscaling and intensification of resources in Australia to prevent and manage stroke. Our analyses focussed on hospital presentations to address the burden of stroke on health services and to examine trends in patient outcomes after hospitalisation.…”

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“…The Fourth Industrial Revolution loads our life with tons of data (1). These data that require routine collection, storage, processing and analysis (2). The support of technological advances, it has led to the concept of 'Big Data' that describe data that is large and massive (1).…”