Digital health: advancing healthcare

Our 2019 e-Health Colloquium in Brisbane once again featured leaders in digital health from around the world. Check out this video for some of the day’s highlights.

Show transcript

[Music plays and an image appears of a poster displaying logos of The Australian e-Health Research Centre, CSIRO, and Queensland Government] [Image changes to show a poster with the text: Enabling the digital health future] [Image changes to show people taking seats in an auditorium at the e-Health conference and text appears: Healthcare is at a turning point… Technology is transforming treatments and services… CSIRO’s Australian e-Health Research Centre is leading the digital disruption.] [Image changes to show Dr David Hansen speaking into a microphone and text appears: “We build the evidence base for the digital transformation of Australia’s health system.” Dr David Hansen, CEO, AEHRC] [Image changes to show a view of people sitting in the auditorium listening and then Dr Rob Grenfell standing at a podium talking, and text appears: Dr Rob Grenfell, Director Health & Biosecurity, CSIRO]

Dr Rob Grenfell: The changes have actually come from here and looking back at the impact that’s actually come out of the Centre for e-Health work, the long enduring relationship with Queensland Health which has actually allowed it to happen, has allowed these sorts of things to actually flourish.

[Music plays and the image changes to show two females in conversation in front of a computer screen and posters at the conference, and text appears: Turning medical notes into useful data] [Image changes to show a male and a female in conversation near computers and posters at the conference and text appears: inventing cutting edge tools for genome research] [Image changes to show a computer screen displaying a computer-generated house layout with a coding window in the corner and text appears: and creating smart homes to improve aged care.] [Image changes to show Dr Qing Zhang at the conference talking in front of a mirror displaying an interactive chart and then he taps a few buttons in the chart and scrolls through graphs, and text appears: Dr Qing Zhang, Team Leader, AEHRC]

Dr Qing Zhang: Every morning when you go to your bathroom you see the mirror and the mirror can tell you what your yesterday’s performance is, including your walking steps, your daily activities and your sleeping qualities and also some other health checks.

[Music plays and the image changes to show people mingling in a room at the conference and text appears: Advances in digital health are empowering patients and clinicians.] [Image changes to show Will Smart talking to the camera in front of e-Health and CSIRO banners and text appears: Will Smart, CIO, NHS England]

Will Smart: What’s exciting today around digital is we are beginning to see digital innovation that will truly transform outcomes for patients for their healthcare.

[Image changes to show Dr Steve Hambleton talking to the camera in front of e-Health and CSIRO banners and text appears: Dr Steve Hambleton, Co-chair, My Health Record Expansion Program]

Dr Steve Hambleton: Everybody knows you can do your banking on your phone. Nobody realises that maybe we should be doing our health on our phones.

[Music plays and the image changes to show a poster about a pilot study on MRI for cystic fibrosis assessment in children and text appears: Using AI to better diagnose diseases] [Image changes to show a poster about cloud-based solutions for advanced genome analysis and text appears: discovering distant relatives] [Image changes to show a hand scrolling through a rehabilitation app on a smartphone and text appears: and an app to boost surgical recovery] [Image changes to show the audience watching a panel of male speakers in the auditorium and text appears: Innovation is driving a new era of collaborative healthcare.] [Image changes to show Will Smart talking to the camera in front of e-Health and CSIRO banners and text appears: Will Smart, CIO, NHS England]

Will Smart: One of the things that a centre like CSIRO can do is actually to create real-world scientific evidence about the impact of these technologies.

[Image changes to show Graham Grieve talking to the camera in front of e-Health and CSIRO banners and text appears: Graham Grieve, Product director, FHIR]

Graham Grieve: That’s the key that the research centres can provide, is provide the evidence on which policy can be driven, to turn what are raw ideas from people out in the community into demonstrated value.

[Image changes to show two males using an app on a tablet and text appears: Our ground-breaking digital health research is being adopted around the world.] [Image changes to show Dr Steve Hambleton talking to the camera in front of e-Health and CSIRO banners and text appears: Dr Steve Hambleton, Co-chair, My Health Record Expansion Program]

Dr Steve Hambleton: We are in a position, in a unique position in the 21st century, to start to build things that are not just scalable nationally, they’re scalable internationally.

[Image changes to show Dr Monica Trujillo talking to the camera in front of e-Health and CSIRO banners and then the camera pans across a room full of people talking to each other at the conference and text appears: Dr Monica Trujillo, CMO, Cerner Asia Pacific]

Dr Monica Trujillo: Well I don’t think that we can go anywhere without the good work that is being done in places like the research centre here, and coming from an industry partner I come from, I see incredible value in actually seeing what the research centre can do to support – put a pillar, I think, I think what they create is a pillar – to support the whole industry.

[Music plays and the Australian E-Health Research Centre and Queensland Government logos appear and text appears: Research. Discovery. Innovation.] [A sound effect plays and the CSIRO logo animation appears]

The digital health innovations we are striving to deliver around the world are not for the sake of moving technology forward – they’re for the advancement of healthcare.

That was one of the key takeaways from the Australian e-Health Research Centre’s 15th annual e-Health Colloquium in Brisbane recently, which gathered together leaders in digital health from around the world.

With a world-class line-up including leaders from NHS England, HL7’s FHIR, the Australian Digital Health Agency and more, the day’s discussions showed that while we have room to grow, we are moving in the right direction in Australian healthcare.

Having the data isn’t enough, we need to use it. Interoperability is key

With the digital revolution we’ve seen a massive increase in data generation and collection across industries, particularly in healthcare. This brings its own challenges around efficient data collection and management, but popping up in discussions throughout the Colloquium was the point that just having the data isn’t enough; we need to be using it properly.

According to Keith McNeil, Assistant Deputy Director and Chief Clinical Information Officer with Queensland Health, consumers are aware their data is being collected – and they expect it to be used a lot more than it currently is.

“The community is saying to us: why aren’t you using my health data to improve my health outcomes?” McNeil said.

“We have to find ways to turn data into useful information so everyone can benefit.”

Will Smart, Chief Information Officer for NHS England, was on the same page.

“Artificial intelligence, genomics and life sciences are the future of digital health – they offer us real opportunities if we can make data intelligence as part of the workflow,” Smart said.

Grahame Grieve, HL7’s FHIR Product Director, discussed the importance of interoperability and said big changes to healthcare systems are needed to address many of our health data challenges. However, he said adoption is starting to happen, particularly with national health records and some clinical data repositories.

The digital health future is bright

The project updates and sneak peeks from our researchers are always one of the highlights at our Colloquiums, and this year was no exception. Attendees heard about:

How our algorithm has been predicting patients’ hospitalisation risk as part of the Australian Government’s Health Care Homes trial
An exciting project using neuroimaging to try predict the development of cerebral palsy
The fantastic outcomes of a trial of our mobile health platform M♡THer to support women with diabetes and their clinicians
An innovative collaboration with the University of Queensland setting health informatics on FHIR for students
Progress on smart homes to help older people stay living independently for longer
A glimpse at the world of digital genome engineering and next-generation tools for health
A thought-provoking discussion on collecting information about Indigenous status in Australia
Amazing new techniques being explored for treatments against cancers
The progress of Activate TKR, a digital platform supporting total knee replacement care.

Watch the video for more highlights from the day, explore the rest of our website for in-depth case studies about our team’s groundbreaking work, and stay tuned for next year’s colloquium – we’re already pulling together our next line-up!