We all recognize that digital technologies are firmly embedded in our lives – the Internet of Things is becoming a reality, growing from 15 billion smart devices in 2015 to at least 50 billion by 2020. It is easier than ever before to connect data-generating appliances, machines and even complete industries to the internet. As a result, we are also creating vast amounts of data, faster and more detailed than ever before – 90% of all data in the world today has been created in the last two years alone.

This big data revolution has led to the emergence of the Fourth Industrial Revolution, which is about combining connected devices with cloud computing, big data analytics and artificial intelligence - our critical infrastructures will become smart.

As compared to a global average of 2–2.5 percent of income spent on IT by healthcare providers, or even 6-15 percent being invested in IT in other sectors within India, anecdotal data from multiple sources indicate that healthcare providers in India rarely spend more than 0.5 percent of their annual revenue on information technology. Rather than investing in the necessary or customized (and consequently more expensive) software solutions that best suits the needs of the hospital, the oft-used strategy is to find cheaper available solutions or adopt those that have been created for smaller setups.

Instead of capitalizing on the immense potential of IT as a competitive differentiator (especially at a time when they could have a substantial first-mover advantage), hospitals in India seem to embrace the “cheap is good, free is better” philosophy. May be it has to do with a legacy mindset from about 20 years ago; however, it is indeed surprising considering the big and aspirational strides that many industries in India have taken.

Patient-generated health data has the power to improve patient care, not just by completing EHR data, but by empowering the patient to engage in their own health.

Between completing EHR information and empowering the patient as a part of the care team, patient-generated health data has the potential to be an integral part of enhancing the overall care for an individual.

The healthcare industry is making headway toward realizing this end in several efforts made to increase the prevalence of patient-generated health data, including using patient-generated data as a part of Stage 3 Meaningful Use requirements, underscore its benefits in other health IT-related initiatives.

But what makes patient-generated health data unique? And how can it aid the complete use of EHRs and improve patient care? By taking a look at patient-generated health data and how it’s gathered, we can better understand its overall healthcare benefits:

There is a boom in healthcare in India and new hospitals are launched every day. But it is ironical that the beds are not getting occupied despite big gap between the demand and supply of beds. "India needs huge investments in creating healthcare infrastructure" is the usual beginning slide in any healthcare conference presentation and hence it sounds a little odd that beds are still unoccupied. The main reason, is the high cost of healthcare (despite being cheapest in the world?). How do we tackle the problem?. Nothing BUT deeper penetration of health insurance can improve this as the main issue for low occupancy is inability of the patients to bear the cost of treatment. Penetration of health insurance is pretty poor in India except for bigger towns where awareness is much better than the tier II and III cities. Rural India is still untouched by that phenomenon. The success of RSBY scheme for the unorganized sector has paved the way to reach the common man wherein a family gets covered for Rs.30,000/- for a small premium. Sure that in future, there will be linkage of NREGA and the UID project (Unique Identification Number project spear headed by Mr Nandan Nilekani of Infosys) with such schemes to make healthcare affordable and available for all citizens. In fact it will be good idea to reimburse the public hospitals for the treatment they give to poor patients through schemes like RSBY to make them self sustainable. Giving  free healthcare will not work for country of our size in terms of population and geographic expanse.