Much is said about new technologies today, about artificial intelligence, about the advance of Bitcoin, about the Internet of things and especially about Big Data.
Data and Big Data are changing many things, not only when it comes to making commercial, sports or political decisions, but also when it comes to creating products, innovating, and above all, improving people’s lives. It is a trend that has become widespread and it seems that it is going to stay with us.
However, despite the fact that many companies abuse this resource for commercial purposes, there are others that are considering new ways of using it for the benefit of society.
One example is the use of Big Data in the health sector. With the increasing use of simple devices such as watches and bracelets, electronic health records, health and wellness applications, and glucose monitors and insulin pumps that have automated diabetes management, we can obtain data on how much and how much we move, how much we sleep, our heart rate, and more, all of which is combined with information from our medical records to define our current health status, predict our health trajectory, and assess risks.
The applications of Big Data in the health sector are numerous and growing. For example, healthcare professionals can use Big Data’s real-time analytics to know where an influenza virus is spreading and at what rate, so they can tailor the response and ensure sufficient vaccine stock for the sites that need it.
An example of how the Big Data has been able to save lives happened a couple of years ago, when a drug’s bad behavior was detected in several patients. This is Vioxx, an analgesic developed by the Merck laboratory that became a bestseller with annual sales of more than 2.5 billion dollars. Vioxx was a success story in the pharmaceutical sector until one of the first applications of Big Data in this sector revealed the truth about the drug. A Californian health consortium and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration used pioneering data analysis techniques to study the medical records of more than one million patients treated with this drug and found that the probability of suffering a heart attack was tripled in those patients. This pain reliever was endangering the lives of millions of people around the world. The study demonstrated the side effects of the drug and led to its withdrawal from the market, saving not dollars or euros but illness and death.
In addition to this area, during the last few years research and development of new technologies focused on Big Data have been directed at other areas, such as safety and quality of life, care for the environment through monitoring of polluting emissions, as well as analysis and optimization of energy consumption, government affairs and the fight against corruption, as well as interpersonal relationships and the way we live together thanks to the Internet and social networks.
Seen in this way, it is the Big Data of the person, for the person in its best version, since we can begin to see the most human side of technology, transforming our lives and improving society.