Health Information Technology Horizon Scanning

The purpose of the Health Information Technology (IT) Horizon Scanning project was to identify the trends that inform the future of health IT research and to develop research priorities based upon those trends. A panel of innovative thinkers was engaged to present their individual insights about trends that may impact the use of health IT to improve health care quality from the perspective of their individual area of expertise. These innovative presentations are referred to collectively as the Visionary Panel Series.

The 12 Visionary Panel presenters included experts from academia, industry, and practice who are knowledgeable about trends impacting health and health care delivery. Each presenter provided a unique view of how the practice of health care and health care research will look in the future. Although each presenter discussed a different topic, all agreed that the current cost of health care is unsustainable and that advances in information technologies have the potential to transform the way that health care is delivered in the future.

Collectively, the Visionary Panel presented five key trends that will drive change in the current health care system: 1) the aging population; 2) consumer expectations for access to conveniently available care; 3) rapid innovation in IT; 4) the use of big data and advanced analytics to improve health care decisionmaking; and 5) recent regulatory actions that have created the opportunity for new health care business models to emerge by aligning incentives to reward quality, not quantity, of care.

The Visionary Panel synthesized the discussions and made recommendations for the types of research needed to better understand the role of health IT in the evolving health care system:

• Advanced Decision Support Tools 
• Big Data Analytics 
• Using Health IT to Display and Communicate Health Information 
• Use of Health IT to Support Distributed Care Models 
• The Use of Health IT to Improve Efficiency 
• Health IT Safety Monitoring and Testing 

These suggestions were intended to inform the future of the AHRQ Health IT Portfolio’s research agenda.