The second annual Medical World Americas (MWA) conference is officially in the books. Innovators from all sectors of health care are now departing from Houston, having discussed not only the myriad problems in the industry today, but what's being done to solve them.

There was a collaborative spirit at MWA that you don't typically find at some of the larger trade shows. While that atmosphere was owing in part to the relatively small scale of the event, it also had to do with the emphasis on sessions and presentations at the show.

By speaking with the organizers, DOTmed News came to understand that the vision for MWA is not the same as Messe Dusseldorf's flagship event, Medica. Where Medica is designed to bring together exhibitors and innovators the world over, MWA has a domestic emphasis. World issues are addressed, but the conversation is rooted in the U.S. and is largely informed by the world's largest medical center, the Texas Medical Center.

Unleashing the value in data

One of the most scrutinized topics at MWA was big data. Like the integrated hospital that will so artfully utilize it, big data still appears to many like an unfulfilled fantasy. Finding ways to leverage the potential of data is of crucial importance. As PricewaterhouseCooper's Larry Hanrahan put it in his keynote, "Data is the new Oil."

And like oil, tapping into data and reaping its benefits presents complex challenges. Dr. Clifford Hudis, from the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York, outlined this problem in a presentation on ASCO's CancerLinQ; an informatics system which aims to bring the value in cancer data to the surface.

Hudis said approximately three percent of adult cancer patients participate in clinical trials. Without digging into the remaining data, that leaves the other 97 percent sort of like islands of diagnostic insight unto themselves. Hudis also pointed out that the average patient is rarely made aware of this.

As an example of what big data utilization could mean to health care, Hudis made an example of Vioxx, an FDA approved medication that was eventually found to cause a two-fold increase in myocardial events. It took 61 months to figure that out, but with complete analytics on all patients taking it, those negative effects might have been discovered in as little as 8-10 weeks.

Remote examination as asset management

A lot of the conversation at MWA was devoted to ways of responsibly implementing telemedicine into hospital systems that are wasting resources on improperly utilized emergency departments. Telemedicine has the potential to reduce crowding, lower treatment costs, and reduce workload on emergency department physicians.

Dr. Alexander H. Vo, from the University of Texas Medical Branch, talked about ways his facility has succeeded in cutting down emergency department visits by as much as 50 percent. He particularly emphasized the value in meeting behavioral health needs through telemedicine, citing primary care providers as frequently overworked and lacking the proper expertise to treat many of those special cases.

Vo said patients with behavioral health issues account for roughly 20 percent of insured patients, and have medical costs two to three times greater than most. These factors contribute to the 20/80 rule, which is the notion that 20 percent of a patient population use up 80 percent of its resources.

Telemedicine is poised to curb those expenses and from a business perspective the momentum is growing exponentially. According to Vo, the global telemedicine market will exceed $27 billion by 2016 — representing 300 percent growth since 2010.

Other findings presented at the show suggest that as many as 80 percent of examinations actually require zero physical content. Leveraging the cost savings implicit in that figure is something everyone in health care is thinking about.

MWA also kicked off with a memorable plenary session, the highlight of which consisted of unveiling some interesting statistics about what 1,000 Texans want from their health care.

It will be interesting to see in what direction MWA goes in the coming years. Most likely the gathering will draw increasingly larger crowds, but hopefully that won't come at the expense of the engaging and collaborative atmosphere — because as of now that atmosphere is what sets this show apart from the others.