Data Science in Health Care

## Introduction to Data Science

### The History of Data Science

Data Science is a term that can be traced back to 1974. It was coined by Pete Naur, a Danish computer science pioneer born on October 25th, 1928. He is best remembered for his contribution to the Backus-Naur form - a type of notation used in describing the syntax for many programming languages, as well as creating the programming language ALGOL 60. Naur proposed the term Data Science as an alternative to Computer Science, specifically to describe a profession that would 'support the understanding and interpretation of the large amounts of data which was being amassed at the time' (Dataversity).

### What is Data Science?

Wikipedia defines Data Science as 'an interdisciplinary academic field that uses statistics, scientific computing, scientific methods, processes, algorithms and systems extract or extrapolate knowledge and insights from noisy, structured and structured data.' In simple terms, Data Science can be defined as the study of data to extract purposeful and relevant insights for any time of business. Data Science can be beneficial for countless fields, such as business, astronomy, economics, medicine, and more.

### Data Collection in Health Care

We have touched on how Data Science is versatile field as it can be used to produce meaningful insights for countless fields and professions. These insights are valuable because they can help companies to improve decision making that will advance performance measures. The field of Medicine and Healthcare is one such field that can greatly benefit from Data Science, with the potential to improve patient outcomes and boost healthcare quality.

#### Types of Data

Data Collection is an essential process in healthcare. Next time you go for a physical, pay attention to how much time your doctor spends typing information into a computer during your visit. They are busy inputting data into a health record system as you speak about your health habits, to ensure they can have that information available for when they need it. Electronic Health Records as described above, are obtained at the point of care, and are the easiest to understand form of electronic clinical data. This data generally remains confidential and is made available only to intern staff - generally including administrative and demographic information, patient insurance, diagnosis, treatment, prescription drugs and more.

Within Electronic Health Records, or EMR is Administrative Data, which Is generally reported to a government agency. This type of data is occasionally made available to the public in the form of query systems that provide access to health statistics and information on hospital inpatient and emergency department utilization. All information on patients and hospitals remains ambiguous.

Data that records billing interactions, or insurance claims, between insured patients and the healthcare delivery system is called Claims Data. The four categories of Claims Data are inpatient, outpatient, pharmacy and enrollment. Included in this form of data is often information such as procedures and treatments, length of visit and diagnosis, in order for insurance companies to process claims in order to determine what should be paid for, and for how much.

Another type of data collection system in healthcare is known as Patient/Disease Registries. Registries are clinical information systems that provide critical information for managing patient condition by tracking a range of data for chronic conditions, such as asthma, hearth disease, Alzheimer's Disease, cancer and diabetes. These registries evaluate outcomes using observational study methods to collect data for populations of specific diseases such as the ones mentioned above.

Other examples of Data in Healthcare include Health Surveys and Clinical Trial Registries. Health Surveys are a useful method for collecting health data for a sample of a population to better understand a larger population. These methods of data collections often come in the form of questionnaires or interviews via any means of communication. Clinical Trial Registries 'ensure that a complete view of research is accessible to all those involved in healthcare decision making' (WHO).

We have discussed the various forms of Data Collection in Healthcare. It becomes apparent that data collection is essential for managing patient, administrative and other forms of health data. Having an immense amount of data is the world of health becomes beneficial when we begin to talk about how we can analyze and gain insights for available data in order to improve all aspects of the health system.