It's not about the procedures, it's about the data...

Original post:  November 21, 2011

My work has moved from the world of commerce to the world of data. Information management is an amorphous subject. It can be molded and shaped in seemingly infinite ways. The data itself is valuable. What is even more valuable (and harder to quantify) is the correlation between the underlying information and knowledge.

I recently posted in another group about the invention of the microscope. The first microscope was fairly humble--not much more sophisticated than the spyglass from Sherlock Holmes. The true power was not in the instrument. Rather, the power was in the information that had always been latent but could now be analyzed for the first time. The ability to see complex animal structures opened up new pathways in science that literally could not have existed before the invention of the microscope.

Computers have an amazing ability to measure. Unfortunately, they are not really smart. They will do as they are told. We can record all kinds of information about a transaction--who purchased what and when. By itself, it isn't really interesting. However, if we notice that there are sudden unexplained spikes in the sale of N95 respirators, it could help us realize that there may have been an outbreak of a contagion like the swine flu in some area of the world. It is that analysis of the data that gives the underlying information so much of its power.

I wonder if we could use some of this type of analysis when it comes to the procedures that are powered by our products. If we had some type of database that could help record the results of the procedures where clinicians used our products, it might allow us to generate some surprising new insights. Those insights may be able to help provide objective evidence in favor of a new way of performing a certain procedure (or proof that an existing treatment is more or less effective than a baseline).

I'm not sure that this type of repository exists, but perhaps we ought to be thinking along those lines. If not, someone else might be glad to step in the breach.