How Technology Can Help Fight Our Most Expensive Health Care Burden

Blog Post by Hilary Kramer Published on Huffington Post

Our lives have transformed so dramatically when it comes to utilizing technology to communicate. We have our hand-held devices, our iPads and tablets as well as our Facebook pages. But, what is most exciting is that we are finally seeing the wireless generation being applied to help advance the care of chronic diseases and conditions.

For example, diabetes places a huge burden and tax on people’s health, quality of life and on our economy. In fact, the statistics are daunting; there are 25 million people in the United States currently suffering from diabetes. The American Diabetes Association has calculated that the disease’s total annual cost to society to be around $218 billion. This translates into approximately $9,000 per diabetic per year. It’s a staggering number for such a terrible and debilitating disease — the full societal, emotional, and health care costs of which we will never fully appreciate.

Diabetes still has a long way to go here in the U.S. However; there are ways to manage the disease. Health care providers and medical companies are quickly learning how to leverage emerging communication and electronic technologies to make diabetes management more efficient, reducing hospitalizations and ultimately decreasing the cost of the disease to individuals and on society.

What’s more, the health care market is seeing a large influx of companies who are putting technology to use in a growing field of healthcare communications and health-record management; at a basic level, this means using technology to manage health records and share information with a patient’s physician or other approved health care providers and caregivers — including family members.

Read More of Hilary Kramer’s Blog Post