Information technology has the possibility of greatly increasing the efficiency of health care. EMRs can reduce the cost of accessing patient information. New technologies can make medical devices more effective.
But is there a cost to increased medical technology? GigaOM wonders
“...will widespread diagnostics increase the burden on healthcare? Somewhere between 10 and 50 percent of autopsies reveal diseases other than the one that killed the patient. If consumers test themselves, then tell their doctors, the medical system could wind up treating 50 percent more diseases than it does today — even those that wouldn’t have killed the patient.”
Will treating diseases before they appear increase health care quality or just drive up costs? On the future will reveal the answer.
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