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An excellent article in Health Data Management by Greg Gillespie gives some wonderful examples of the power of analytics to improve health outcomes, looking at data from some of the 2,000+ clinical trials that Cleveland Clinic is currently running.

I strongly encourage you to read the original article (also available in pdf format), but here are summaries of the three use cases highlighted: hand-washing analytics, central-line analytics, and blood-transfusion analytics.

Data Transparency and Hand-Washing Compliance

Cleveland Clinic uses SAP BusinessObjects Dashboards (Xcelsius) to display information, change behavior, and avoid infections:

Cleveland Clinic has developed a program where staff from compliance anonymously watch workers in different departments and record whether they do in fact follow hand hygiene guidelines. Their findings are uploaded into Cleveland Clinic’s enterprise analytics system and are accessible via a dashboard tab.

Four years ago, the system was showing a 40 percent compliance rate with hand hygiene guidelines. Now the compliance rate is staying well over 90 percent, staving off a significant number of hospital-acquired infections and other complications arising from hygiene issues.

“That’s the critical value of data transparency—you can show people what they’re really doing as opposed to what they think they’re doing, and we can show it on a department, unit-by-unit or individual practitioner level,” says Steve Davis M.D. “I’ve found that when you put that kind of information in front of physicians, their competitive streak really comes out. No one likes to get a ‘C’ on their report card, and if you don’t have data everyone assumes they’re getting an ‘A.’ When they find out they’re not, then they get moving.”

[By coincidence, a post in the Decision Factor blog also takes up the theme of hand-washing this week, arguing that data cleansing is the single most important means of avoiding bad decisions. ]

Reducing Infections While Saving Money

By carefully collecting and analyzing data, Cleveland Clinic has been able to reduce infection rates, spend less on equipment, and avoid costs of up to $30,000 per affected patient:

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimate that nearly 250,000 of the bloodstream infections occur annually from procedural issues associated with inserting and maintaining central lines—tubes inserted near the heart or a large blood vessel that are used to give fluids, antibiotics, medical treatments such as chemotherapy, and liquid food.

Overhauling the health system’s approach to central-line infections had a significant financial return in addition to the clinical benefits.

Before clinical and business analytics were applied, each individual unit was responsible for ordering their own lines, which meant that more than 30 different lines (and more than 90 different PICC lines, another type of tube) were being used across Cleveland Clinic, which was not only financially inefficient but also clinically dangerous.

By streamlining the purchasing to one vendor, the equipment and maintenance costs dropped significantly. And standardizing the clinical processes resulted in major cost avoidance—it’s estimated by the Health Research Educational trust that central-line infections add upwards of $30,000 in treatment costs per afflicted patient.

Best-Practice Blood Transfusions

A blood transfusion dashboard helps identify physicians that haven’t kept up with the latest information in health best practice, improve the supply of blood, and reduces costs:

Andrew Proctor, administrative director of medical operations for Cleveland Clinic has developed a blood utilization dashboard that enables department heads and others to drill down to a physician level how much blood is being used for transfusions.

Standard industry practice used call for ordering transfusions if a patient’s hemoglobin count was below 10 after surgery or due to critical illness, But about a decade ago, says Davis, medical research showed convincingly that blood transfusions given at those hemoglobin values, and even significantly lower, in nearly all cases did more harm than good, providing few benefits and increasing the risks of nosocomial infections.

“Blood transfusions is another area where physician behavior has changed slower than the evidence, and our data is helping drive that behavioral change by enabling us to determine where blood utilization still goes against best practices, and addressing the issue on a unit or individual physician basis,” Davis says.

The result has been a significant reduction in blood utilization, which equates to a significant reductions in costs associated with maintaining the blood supply, and an improvement in patient outcomes.

Health Data + Analysis Saves Lives

I believe we’ve only scratched the surface of what is possible using analytics. New developments in big data mobile, cloud, analytic, and collaborative technology are combining to create new ways of improving health care.

Examples include the new SAP Collaborative E-Care Management application that connects patients, care providers and their families through medical monitoring software and mobile devices to better manage their health with individualized treatment plans:

And the pioneering work being done in conjunction with Charité, Europe’s largest teaching hospital, to enable mobile access to health data anytime, anywhere, including the SAP HANA-based Oncolyzer cancer-research application.

For more information, visit the Healthcare area of SAP.com

Related posts:

• OLAP is Dead (Long Live Analytics)
• Explorer OnDemand for the iPhone (and soon the iPad)
• Business Analytics in Russia
• SAP Innovation Tour in the Baltics

Filed under All, Best practice, Featured · Tagged with Analytics, Berlin, Best practice, BI, Business Intelligence, BusinessObjects, Charité, Cleveland Clinic, Dashboards, Data, Doctors, Health, Information, Mobile, Physician, Research, SAP, Tablets, Xcelsius

Article source: http://timoelliott.com/blog/2012/03/concrete-examples-of-how-health-intelligence-saves-lives.html

Live today Live today at 11:00GMT El Reg front-man Jon Collins is packing our studio with some information management experts that we hope will give you a leg-up on your BI initiatives.

Tony Lock from Freeform Dynamics is coming along with a stash-bag of findings from the latest research that many of you took part in. We’ve also got Chris Smyth from Parity Solutions who’s going to share his opinions on how business processes play a critical role in information management.

Finally, we have OFSTED’s head of architecture, Tom Zebedee, patching in live to share his experiences from the front line. Tom’s got a rack of experience in this field so you can expect some real hands-on insight.

Between the four of them, we reckon we’ve got our information management angles pretty well covered. But we’d like your input too. The gig is live and if you turn up, from the comfort of your desk, you can throw questions at this bunch and any other input you might have. Sound good? You can read more and join us right here.

Article source: http://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.co.uk/2012/03/13/bi_public_sector_event/

LONDON–(BUSINESSWIRE)–

New standard in cloud-delivered business intelligence reduces initial
time to supplier-centric visibility from months to days

Knowing your suppliers is now as quick as logging into Facebook to learn
who is connected to you.

Rosslyn Analytics, the global leader in Business Intelligence delivered
as-a-Service (BIAS), today announced the availability of RA.Pid
Supplier Risk Profile (www.supplier-risk-analysis.com),
a new suite of packaged information feeds that enables finance,
procurement and supply chain organizations to collaboratively evaluate,
monitor and mitigate supplier-centric risks in real-time in just five
business days, not months, from a single screen.

“The current generation of supply risk management tools are costing
businesses millions because they fail to provide customers with a
comprehensive view of enterprise-wide business intelligence in a timely
manner,” said Charles Clark, CEO of Rosslyn Analytics.

Rosslyn Analytics’ RA.Pid cloud-based data services and analytics
platform provides users with a unified view into supplier and supply
chain problems before they become disruptions such as supplier
dependency, financial problems, natural disasters, contract compliance
and geo-political concerns.

“Rosslyn Analytics gives decision-makers access to the necessary deep
contextual information essential to uncover hidden risks and
opportunities by linking tagged data to multiple external and internal
relevant data sources for on-demand analysis,” added Charles Clark.

Key benefits of RA.Pid:

• Monitor the financial vulnerability of your suppliers with Credit
  Ratings
• Identify the highest water usage and Carbon Emissions across
  your entire supply chain
• Identify Supplier Dependency such as business exposure as a %
  of total revenue
• Quickly assess the cost impact of Natural Disasters on your
  supply chain
• Immediately respond to and track Market Conditions with
  streamed news
• Instantly identify alternative suppliers with real-time Geo-Location
  information
• Track Societal Unrest including labour strikes that may shut
  down supplier operations
• Ensure Company Directors of suppliers are not on international
  watch lists or convicted felons

“Rosslyn Analytics is taking the market lead in the development of
new data standards to facilitate the easy delivery and consumption of
actionable business intelligence for organizations,” said John
Campbell, Alliance Director, QlikTech. “Rosslyn Analytics, in
partnership with QlikTech, is pushing Business Discovery to new
levels by keeping decision-makers globally connected to relevant
information at the click of a mouse.”

RA.Pid is quick to deploy because customers do not need to
install software or hardware, hire consultants or have training.

Facebook-Style Supplier Risk Management

One of the obstacles to effective supplier risk management is an
inability of organizations to accurately aggregate information from
disparate sources in a timely manner.

Rosslyn Analytics is the first technology company in the world that has
the tools and expertise to connect your company’s supplier data to the
world’s information, making business insight universally accessible and
useful to everyone in your organization.

“Rosslyn Analytics has developed a multi-purpose analytics
platform that drastically reduces the time and cost for organizations to
evaluate and proactively reduce supply chain disruptions, optimize
spend, manage supplier performance – and much more –all-in-one packaged
information solution,” added Rosslyn Analytics’ chief innovation
officer, Hugh Cox.

The speed and efficiency in delivering a complete and integrated view of
key suppliers and supply chains is possible because Rosslyn Analytics
has developed proprietary technologies that automatically extract and
transform data into information for use across your business.

One such technology is RA.DAR, a high performance artificial
intelligence engine that links structured enterprise data with
unstructured external information. RA.DAR maps its databases of
interconnected worldwide information to your suppliers to provide a
unified view of all supplier performance and risk intelligence in
easy-to-use drill-down analytical reports accessible from the RA.Pid
analytics platform.

Get Started Today

To register for a free 30-day trial to the RA.Pid platform, visit our
website at www.supplier-risk-analysis.com
or www.rosslynanalytics.com.
To receive a demo, please contact us at marketing@rosslynanalytics.com.

## #

About Rosslyn Analytics

For organizations focused on accelerating business performance and
profitability, Rosslyn Analytics, the hot company to watch in 2012, is
the fastest way to a new heighted level of enterprise-wide visibility
linked to the world’s information. The largest companies in the world
use our cloud-based data services and analytics platform, RA.Pid, to
collaboratively report, analyze and benchmark business-critical spend
and supplier-related data in minutes TODAY without having to install
software or hardware, or employ consultants or have training. To
experience the new revolution in business intelligence delivered as a
service, register for a free 30-day trial at www.rosslynanalytics.com.

Contact

Rosslyn Analytics
Lance Mercereau
+44 (0)7788 183 273
lm@rosslynanalytics.com

Article source: http://uk.finance.yahoo.com/news/rosslyn-analytics-launches-world-first-124600067.html

JACKSONVILLE, Fla.–(BUSINESS WIRE)–

Social Strategy1, a leading provider of online business intelligence and
advocate for social media and small business, announced today the
release of Beam
Social, a revolutionary social media marketing application designed
to help small businesses in America grow online.

The cloud-based small business software application, which is sold on a
subscription basis for as little as $29 per month, makes it easier for
small businesses to build an effective social media marketing presence
with real-time conversations. Beam Social analyzes relevant data
captured through online channels (social networks, microblogging,
eCommerce, and other websites that share ratings, rankings, and
comments) and delivers this information in a unified and meaningful way,
enabling small businesses in America to directly engage with buyers
real-time, by monitoring buyer behavior. Small business owners are
provided with an easy to use platform, along with the engagement tools
needed to administer social media marketing campaigns, coupons,
sweepstakes, and other apps to help convert leads.

A recent
social media study of small businesses [infographic] reveals that
even though business owners use it for personal use, they do not know
how to apply social media to their business. By giving small businesses
access to a very simple, yet powerful analytics and engagement tool,
Beam Social expects to see a growing number of SMB’s finding success
through social media in 2012.

“With Beam Social, we’re looking to tear down the barriers between small
businesses and social media,” explained Social Strategy1’s Chairman and
Founder, Mike Lewis. “Any small business owner will be able to build and
manage an exceptional social media presence, easily and efficiently and
ultimately grow their business. The potential is huge.”

“We really focused on building a simple and intuitive platform for Beam
Social,” said Alex Avendano, Product Manager and Strategist for Social
Strategy1. “You only need to know the basics of social media to start
using it – plus, it’s quite affordable. That opens doors that were
previously shut off from small businesses.”

Beam Social customers not only have access to the most powerful small
business software currently on the market for social media – they also
are able to rely on the knowledge of Social Strategy1’s marketing
experts to perfect their social media strategy.

Social Strategy1 unveiled Beam Social to a select group of OfficeArrow
members in a webinar titled “Cash
in on Social Media” led by Alex Avendano and joined by industry
authority Steve Ennen, President and Chief Intelligence Officer of
Social Strategy1. For additional information about Beam Social including
pricing and features, visit http://bit.ly/beamsocial.

Beam Social is a service of Social Strategy1; a social media strategy
and business -intelligence Company. The Company translates real-time
social media activity into a framework for improving the fundamental
areas of business (Operations, Human Resources, Customer Service,
Distribution, Finance, Legal). Social Strategy1 was developed in
collaboration with The Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania,
where students and academics used the platform to focus on the more
meaningful metrics and proofs of performance in a total media strategy.
For more information, visit www.socialstrategy1.com
or follow “@sstrategy1” on Twitter.

Social Strategy1
Ilona Olayan, 904-273-2440
ilona@socialstrategy1.com

Article source: http://finance.yahoo.com/news/social-media-marketing-toolkit-helps-185800360.html

A recent survey of the IBM SHARE user group found just 25% of respondents were collecting data from social media networks for business purposes, though many more are apparently planning to do so in the near future.

RELATED: IBM moves 1Tbps of data on an optical chip

The study, which was performed by Unisphere Research and sponsored by Marist University and Big Blue itself, discovered that more than half of the North American and European companies surveyed planned to invest more in business intelligence tools related to social media within the next year or two.

“Social media networks and peer groups are creating large data sets that are now enabling companies and organizations to gain competitive advantage and improve performance. These data sets provide important insights into customer behavior, brand reputation, and the overall customer experience,” the researchers said in a summary.

The adoption pattern for the technology forms a “classic bell curve,” they added, with companies running the gamut between early adopters and laggards.

SaaS- and cloud-based social media tools will likely see slower uptake, the study found. While just 15% of respondents indicated they planned to adopt such systems in the next year, that number should grow noticeably over the next two to three years.

The relative youth of the technologies involved made it difficult to identify conclusive trends in data volume, hosting and other areas, according to the researchers. That’s a pattern that has been seen before, and one that has contributed to ongoing uncertainty in some parts of the cloud market in particular.

Email Jon Gold at jgold@nww.com and follow him on Twitter at @NWWJonGold.

For more information about enterprise networking, go to NetworkWorld. Story copyright 2011 Network World Inc. All rights reserved.

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Article source: http://www.pcworld.com/article/251715/survey_75_of_companies_dont_collect_social_media_info.html

In recent years, the business intelligence (BI) market has shifted from one that has only served larger enterprises toward an industry ripe with multiple types of offerings to address a variety of organizational business pains. For smaller and mid-sized organizations, this means that what was once out of reach is now a viable option. Storage is less expensive, processing times are quicker, and licensing and support is no longer a stumbling block to adoption due to the increase in subscription-based models. Add this to hosted offerings and solutions that are developed targeting small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs), and organizations now have something to work with.

For the past few years, more and more SMBs have been looking toward business intelligence and data warehousing solutions to consolidate disparate data sources, enhance their business visibility and conduct more in-depth and standardized analytics. Many current market trends actually work to the benefit of these companies by providing lower cost solutions that are quicker to implement. When looking at trends a few years ago, most of what the mid-market had to go on were lower price points and enterprise architected offerings with watered down features and functions. This is no longer the case. Solutions are more mature and many smaller vendors have developed BI offerings that speak specifically to smaller enterprises.

This series of articles focuses on some of these market trends and the implications of adoption for the small and medium business (SMB) market. Part 1 looks at cloud computing and open source, while Part 2 will look at how mobile access enhances ease of use, the maturity of data management and the focus on social access. This includes looking at social network analytics, social media analysis and collaborative/social business intelligence. Together, these articles will provide the basis for understanding why SMBs are now able to take advantage of business intelligence and analytics without the roadblocks that once existed.

Cloud Computing and Wider Accessibility to Data

Data in the cloud is a key trend within the BI market. For the past few years, organizations and vendors have started turning toward externally hosted solutions with the promise of easy implementation, access, and interaction with solutions. In essence, software as a service (SaaS) BI offerings were being touted as the way to access self-service analytics and dashboards. As cloud computing started to take hold, the concept of data as a service (DaaS) became more relevant to the market with vendors starting to offer ways of hosting large organizational data sets. With security, privacy, and governance continually requiring measures to control data access, the ability to house information outside the firewall but still maintain the strong levels of control desired provided many organizations with a way to take advantage of the DaaS infrastructure while controlling information access. When looking at organizations with a large number of developer projects, not having to set aside internal servers provides an added bonus.

As an extension of hosted applications, more and more organizations have begun turning to outside providers for data storage, analytics, and the like to provide quicker access to information and analytics. The use of cloud computing offerings is quite similar, especially for many SMBs. The ability to pay a subscription fee to house data externally creates a data warehousing infrastructure that remains a fixed cost within the organization. In addition, many solution providers are adding the option of cloud to access their offerings, making access to mature market offerings much more realistic. Although in the long term accessing data in the cloud might actually be more costly for SMBs, the ability to budget for business intelligence and understand the limitations up front provides a feeling of security in relation to BI adoption and use.

However, with any benefits come challenges. One of the big ones SMBs should be aware of are any limitations that exist within the cloud. Obviously, technological advancements mean broader delivery, more storage, quicker processing speeds, and the like. What it also means is that many vendors put constraints around data volumes stored, number of users, types of uses, etc. All of these limitations may affect fixed costs associated with business intelligence and growth over time, making cloud offerings a potential benefit but also challenging mid-market expansion over time. What hosted and cloud-based business intelligence has done on a broader level is provide many SMBs access to BI products that they would otherwise not be able to consider.

Open Source Accessibility

The open source business intelligence market has continued to expand and become a fairly mainstream option for many organizations. In smaller businesses with limited budgets, many developers are already familiar with open source environments. In these cases, expanding general open source adoption to business intelligence specifically may seem like the obvious choice. Many developers are more than willing to deploy and customize solutions to fit their organization’s business needs through analytics. In addition, with the commercialization of open source business intelligence, the reality is that there are not many differences from traditional BI sources. Because many SMBs look at open source first, the ability to provide valuable solutions for this market has always been a benefit of open source community feedback and quick product release cycles.

However, the challenges to open source are also broad. The continued shift toward commercial offerings makes it harder and harder to differentiate certain open source BI offerings from traditional BI counterparts. This can make it more difficult to sell the value proposition of free access to software and community with so many solutions now providing free trial versions and access to personal BI offerings. Some business decision makers within SMBs are starting to find open source more appealing because of the push toward commercialization, while others fail to understand differentiations that exist due to a crowded marketplace. In either case, free source code is no longer enough to draw open source BI adoption as organizations look for the key differentiators of each solution on their desired short list.

Linking Cloud Computing and Open Source BI to SMB Adoption

Both cloud and open source availability help SMBs get access to business intelligence. For organizations not wanting to invest heavily in new hardware and software the promise of cloud computing is great. No upfront additional investments outside a yearly subscription fee are necessary to provide BI access. Open source does enable businesses to get up and running more quickly as many solutions can be downloaded and accessed fairly easily. Optimization, ease of use, and maintenance may be other issues, but there are no roadblocks to direct access. Both of these BI trends provide broader access to business intelligence in general, and specifically to SMBs. With more options and more diversity, businesses can utilize the technologies they require without having to compromise based on vendor offering limitations. Overall, each has enabled broader adoption in its own way, and also helped broaden what SMBs see as potential deployment methods and access points for their BI and analytics environments.

• Lyndsay Wise
  

  Lyndsay is the President and Founder of WiseAnalytics, an independent analyst firm specializing in business intelligence, master data management and unstructured data. For more than seven years, she has assisted clients in business systems analysis, software selection and implementation of enterprise applications. Lyndsay conducts regular research studies, consults, writes articles and speaks about improving the value of business intelligence within organizations. She can be reached at lwise@wiseanalytics.com.

  Editor’s Note: More articles and resources are available in Lyndsay’s BeyeNETWORK Expert Channel. Be sure to visit today!

Recent articles by Lyndsay Wise

• Does Social Business Intelligence Exist?
• Why Data and Customer Management are Important for Small and Medium Businesses
• Business Intelligence Project Checklist
• SMB Trends Help the Broader Business Intelligence Market

Article source: http://www.b-eye-network.com/view/15926

Microsoft will hike licensing prices for the soon-to-launch SQL Server 2012 Enterprise edition by an average of 20 per cent, resellers have claimed.

From, er, April Fools’ Day, customers who buy the top level version will be charged based on the numbers of cores licensed rather than the number of servers used.

The Standard edition model will give users the choice of paying for cores or servers, and the Business Intelligence edition is based on server and client access licences (CAL) only.

“Microsoft’s changes to SQL Server licensing are a reflection of the changes in the database industry and the evolution of hardware,” a spokesman at the software giant told The Register.

“Internal customer research with hundreds of customers has shown that customers with database and datacenter scenarios prefer the new licensing model and consider it a simple and more predictable model,” the vendor’s spinner said.

It is true that Microsoft admitted back in January that SQL Server licensing changes would likely impact pricing but kept mum on the extent of the increase.

Resellers reckon that, on average, prices will rise by roughly a fifth, and voiced surprise that Microsoft is finally moving to a model adopted by rivals years ago and one that it heavily criticised.

“There is a bit of panic from customers; they are having to sort out budgets in advance to save money,” said one.

One large dealer said customers can opt for a mini Enterprise Agreement – Enterprise for Application Platform (EAP) – at current pricing levels, which entitles them to a free upgrade under Software Assurance to SQL Server 2012.

According to a Microsoft-commissioned report by Forrester Research, upgrading to the new version of SQL is a no-brainer – it will pay for itself in 12 to 14 months with an expected ROI of 149 to 189 per cent.

Microsoft refused to comment on SQL Server 2012 licensing prices. ®

Article source: http://www.channelregister.co.uk/2012/03/13/sql_server_prices/