Big Data, Small Devices: How Technology Is Advancing Public Health

Moderator
Anna Barker, Fellow, FasterCures, a Center of the Milken Institute; Professor and Director, Transformative Healthcare Networks, and Co-Director, Complex Adaptive Systems Network, Arizona State University

Speakers
Helen Burstin, Chief Scientific Officer, National Quality Forum

Atul Butte, Director, Institute of Computational Health Sciences, and Professor of Pediatrics, University of California, San Francisco

Eric Friedman, Chief Technology Officer and Co-Founder, Fitbit

Kyu Rhee, Chief Health Officer, IBM Corp.

We constantly hear that technology is improving medicine and medical research through genomics, better medical devices and the advent of precision medicine. We rarely hear about the ways technology is transforming public health. This session will focus on the less-discussed technological revolution taking place in public health and how big data can be mined, analyzed and curated to predict epidemics, improve quality of life and avoid preventable deaths. For example, correlation of health information and demographic data would enable doctors to analyze whether the physical environment contributes to a patient’s illness. Does an asthma patient live near a heavily used freeway? Additionally, our panel will explore the potential of ever-growing databases collected from wearable devices and mobile apps that allow problems to be spotted before they occur. Additionally, our panel will explore the potential of ever-growing databases collected from wearable devices and mobile apps that allow problems to be spotted before they occur.

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