Edward M. Rafalski – författare

The first COVID-19 case in the US was reported on January 20, 2020. As the first cases were being reported in the US, Washington State became a reliable source not just for hospital bed demand based on incidence and community spread but also for modeling the impact of skilled nursing facilities and assisted living facilities on hospital bed demand. Various hospital bed demand modeling efforts began in earnest across the United States in university settings, private consulting and health systems. Nationally, the University of Washington Institute of Health Metrics and Evaluation seemed to gain a footing and was adopted as a source for many states for its ability to predict the epidemiological curve by state, including the peak.

This book therefore addresses a compelling need for documenting what has been learned by the academic and professional healthcare communities in healthcare analytics and disaster preparedness to this point in the pandemic. What is clear, at least from the US perspective, is that the healthcare system was unprepared and uncoordinated from an analytics perspective. Learning from this experience will only better prepare all healthcare systems and leaders for future crisis.

Both prospectively, from a modeling perspective and retrospectively from a root cause analysis perspective, analytics provide clarity and help explain causation and data relationships. A more structured approach to teaching healthcare analytics to students, using the pandemic and the rich dataset that has been developed, provides a ready-made case study from which to learn and inform disaster planning and preparedness. The pandemic has strained the healthcare and public health systems. Researchers and practitioners must learn from this crisis to better prepare our processes for future pandemics, at minimum. Finally, government officials and policy makers can use this data to decide how best to assist the healthcare and public health systems in crisis.

The first COVID-19 case in the US was reported on January 20, 2020. As the first cases were being reported in the US, Washington State became a reliable source not just for hospital bed demand based on incidence and community spread but also for modeling the impact of skilled nursing facilities and assisted living facilities on hospital bed demand. Various hospital bed demand modeling efforts began in earnest across the United States in university settings, private consulting and health systems. Nationally, the University of Washington Institute of Health Metrics and Evaluation seemed to gain a footing and was adopted as a source for many states for its ability to predict the epidemiological curve by state, including the peak.

This book therefore addresses a compelling need for documenting what has been learned by the academic and professional healthcare communities in healthcare analytics and disaster preparedness to this point in the pandemic. What is clear, at least from the US perspective, is that the healthcare system was unprepared and uncoordinated from an analytics perspective. Learning from this experience will only better prepare all healthcare systems and leaders for future crisis.

Both prospectively, from a modeling perspective and retrospectively from a root cause analysis perspective, analytics provide clarity and help explain causation and data relationships. A more structured approach to teaching healthcare analytics to students, using the pandemic and the rich dataset that has been developed, provides a ready-made case study from which to learn and inform disaster planning and preparedness. The pandemic has strained the healthcare and public health systems. Researchers and practitioners must learn from this crisis to better prepare our processes for future pandemics, at minimum. Finally, government officials and policy makers can use this data to decide how best to assist the healthcare and public health systems in crisis.

This is a comprehensive, practical guide which looks at the advantages and limitations of new data analysis techniques being introduced across public health and administration services.

The Affordable Care Act (ACT) and free market reforms in healthcare are generating a rapid change of pace. The "electronification" of medical records from paper to digital, which is required to meet the meaningful use standards set forth by the Act, is advancing what and how information can be analyzed. Coupled with the advent of more computing power and big data analytics and techniques, practitioners now more than ever need to stay on top of these trends. This book presents a comprehensive look at healthcare analytics from population data to geospatial analysis using current case studies and data analysis examples in health.

This resource will appeal to undergraduate and graduate students in health administration and public health. It will benefit healthcare professionals and administrators in nursing and public health, as well as medical students who are interested in the future of data within healthcare.