Healthcare Business Intelligence (BI): Comprehensive Guide

There is one thing that can completely change how healthcare organizations approach their patients. It’s data. And one of the best ways to manage and use it for insights is business intelligence. In healthcare, business intelligence tools play a far more critical role than might initially seem. These tools often hold the key to solving challenges and addressing the situations, where timely access to data is paramount. Accelerated drug discovery, enhanced operational efficiency, and real-time monitoring of high-risk patients are just some of the many benefits BI has to offer.

In our guide, we will explore why business intelligence software becomes an absolute necessity rather than a choice and why you should implement it in your organization right now.

Intro to Healthcare Business Intelligence (BI)

Business intelligence refers to a set of tools, technologies, and techniques for collecting, analyzing, and sharing data. In healthcare, business intelligence plays an especially important role, as it can be used to create better treatments, personalize patient care, prevent diseases, keep patients’ personal info safe, and even detect fraud.

Healthcare business intelligence software is a must-have for any organization in the industry. You are most likely well aware that these organizations often manage vast amounts of data that have the potential to impact the quality of patients’ lives. It’s as simple as it gets: the better your data analysis is, the better the care you provide. Thus, if you are a healthcare or pharmaceutical company that still hasn’t implemented any business intelligence tools, now is the best time to consider them.

Role of BI in Healthcare

As business intelligence’s significance in the world grows, the healthcare industry is also starting to leverage its benefits and apply them to solve problems related to healthcare analytics and data management, among others.

In healthcare, every single piece of information about either the patient, the treatment, or the patient care provider could play a vital role. However, managing all this data is quite a challenge for many organizations, even those that are digitally mature and have sufficient resources and talent.

In a world where data is a key player, it’s important to have the ability to handle large volumes of information and help healthcare organizations make informed decisions when treating patients and looking for opportunities to provide enhanced patient care. This is where business intelligence comes in, serving as a cost-effective solution that leads to better patient outcomes, decreased operation costs, and more efficient use of data.

According to studies, healthcare business intelligence is used to analyze patient data, optimize healthcare operations, improve the effectiveness of clinical trials, and even detect fraud. In the future, a number of hospitals, clinics, and other healthcare organizations will leverage the combination of business intelligence and artificial intelligence to analyze data and make the right decision based on the analysis.

BI Types Applicable to Healthcare

There are many different data sources healthcare organizations can use to get important information. Understanding where healthcare providers can gather data is essential to ensure a continuous flow of valuable insights, without which it would be hard to implement BI solutions effectively. Here are some key sources:

A proper analysis of all of this data can assist healthcare organizations in improving patient outcomes since providers will gain fresh insights into internal operations.

Who Utilizes Business Intelligence in the Healthcare Industry?

So, who might benefit from implementing BI tools? These are examples of healthcare companies and organizations that use business intelligence:

Hospitals

Healthcare business intelligence solutions include better optimization of hospital operations, improved workflows, and enhanced patient care. Moreover, healthcare BI allows hospitals to plan their activities better and find out more about how well they perform and what they could change.

Health insurance providers

Health insurance companies can use business intelligence to analyze claims, detect fraud, and even conduct risk analysis. All of this can improve the companies’ performance, making the processes of reviewing and approving claims much faster and more efficient.

Government health agencies and institutions

Many local and global health agencies aim to prevent diseases and outbreaks, provide equal access to healthcare, and promote healthy habits and lifestyles. These agencies must process a large amount of data every day to analyze modern health trends, monitor outbreaks, and track population health. Business intelligence in healthcare gives these health agencies an opportunity to make more data-driven decisions based on the quick analysis and breakdown of all the collected information, which would have otherwise taken a lot more time and potentially even weeks and months.

Pharma companies and manufacturers

Like any healthcare company, life sciences and biotech businesses must gather and analyze data. With BI, these companies can focus on optimizing processes such as drug development and supply chain management and potentially even innovating and developing new solutions.

How BI Enhances Healthcare: Key Examples

Healthcare BI solutions can have a huge impact on how organizations in the healthcare and life sciences industries operate. Here are some of the ways in which BI can positively affect patient care:

Enhance patient safety and treatment outcomes 

With advanced analytics integrated into systems used by healthcare institutions, clinics, and other facilities, it’s possible to predict treatment outcomes before even starting them. As a result, a healthcare provider will have access to a full report of possible outcomes and potential risks, improving patient care and preventing dangerous situations from escalating.

Improve patient management systems

One of the best ways to increase patient satisfaction is to provide more personalized healthcare. Even with modern-day solutions, it’s hard to find enough time and resources to personalize treatment for each patient. However, with the help of some technologies, such as business intelligence, it is possible to create more efficient patient management systems that include such features as data visualization and predictive healthcare analytics, which makes it possible to provide patients with more personalized and timely care.

Reduce expenses

Business intelligence in healthcare can reveal hidden costs that might otherwise go unnoticed for years. BI tools can track billing data, operational costs, and other expenses and provide a full analysis of financial performance and possible issues. Healthcare organizations that use BI solutions better track and manage their resources, reducing redundant expenses and making more cost-effective decisions.

Detect and reduce insurance fraud

Early detection of fraud enables companies to minimize financial losses and mitigate risks. The best part is that this process can be completely automated, as many business intelligence tools are capable of conducting a full analysis of all financial data and detecting fraudulent activities without human intervention. When a potential fraud is flagged, BI software immediately alerts the responsible experts for further investigation.

Improved compliance

With business intelligence, healthcare and pharmaceutical organizations can ensure the safety of all patients’ data and compliance with current regulations and laws. BI tools can be used as a centralized platform for storing and analyzing data, consolidating multiple origins of data into a single, reliable ecosystem. Moreover, business intelligence can also be used to identify anomalies that could lead to compliance issues.

Main Use Cases in the Healthcare Industry

Let’s review some of the most common use cases of business intelligence tools in the healthcare industry.

Personalized patient care

Business intelligence in healthcare is a lot more than just a tool to manage and organize data. It can benefit individual healthcare providers just as much as whole hospitals and other facilities. Let’s say there is a patient who encountered the same issue a few years ago. Instead of looking at the problems from the past and present separately, a doctor can use BI to have a full picture of the patient’s health and medical history, giving the specialists more resources and tools to give a more accurate diagnosis and find better treatment for the patient.

Outcomes:

• Satisfied patients;
• Better treatment personalization;
• Higher quality patient care.

Fraud detection

As we discussed earlier, business intelligence in healthcare can be used to detect fraud and technical errors. One way healthcare organizations can implement BI tools to safeguard against fraud is by using them to monitor claims, with alerts set to trigger whenever there is unusual activity, suspicious behavior, or unauthorized access. Many healthcare BI tools also analyze data for irregularities such as overbilling, upcoding, or unbundling.

Outcomes:

• Reduced expenses;
• Minimized safety risks;
• Improved resource allocation.

Health management of the population

With business intelligence, it becomes possible for medical professionals to monitor different patient groups on a much larger scale compared to what healthcare organizations can do right now. BI allows for tracking of millions of individuals at the time, contributing to better management of health trends and prevention of public health crises. For example, a health department can use BI to monitor flu vaccination rates across different regions, quickly identifying areas with a low percentage of vaccinated individuals and finding ways to increase uptake.

Outcomes:

• Enhanced management of public health;
• Data-driven decision-making;
• Improved access to healthcare among the population;
• Lower mortality rates.

Top BI Tools for Decision-Making in Healthcare

There are many solutions available to handle complex data in healthcare services. Here are some of the most popular options:

Looker by Google

This Google platform offers everything needed for deep insights into a company’s data while also serving as a foundation for exploring artificial intelligence’s capabilities in data analytics. Moreover, Looker offers opportunities for creating custom data apps.

Features:

• Embedded analytics;
• Semantic modeling layer;
• Collaboration tools;
• Real-time data exploration;
• Action hub.

Power BI by Microsoft

This tool provides healthcare professionals with a wide range of features that guarantee quick access to important health data. With Power BI, healthcare providers can gather, analyze and share data in emergency situations to quickly make decisions that are best for patients. Moreover, Power BI allows for harnessing clinical and operational data that enables better future predictions and minimizes data threats.

Features:

• Integration with Microsoft 365 tools;
• Custom data visualization;
• Data analytics;
• Data sharing;
• Real-time dashboards;
• Automated compliance reporting.

Tableau

This is a data analytics platform that is widely used in healthcare to analyze and visualize data from various sources. One of the most popular features of Tableau is data visualization, which the platform executes in just a few clicks.

Features:

• Data blending;
• AI-powered analytics;
• Charts;
• Seamless integration with already existing software;
• Operational reporting.

Final Remarks

Data is power. Those who know how to leverage it gain the ability to make healthcare more personalized and effective. In contrast, those who omit using data analytics will barely scratch the surface of its potential.

If you are ready to explore the opportunities business intelligence has to offer, don’t hesitate to contact us for a free consultation to break down the processes of creating bespoke BI patient management systems, data analytics apps, and other custom solutions.

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