IBM Invests $100M in Healthcare Research

IBM recently announced plans to enlist some of the company's leading scientists and technologists to help medical practitioners and insurance companies provide high-quality, evidence-based care to patients. As part of this initiative, IBM is hiring medical doctors to work alongside its researchers to develop new technologies, scientific advancements, and business processes for healthcare and insurance providers.

Dedicating $100 million over the next three years, the initiative will draw on IBM's leadership in systems integration, services research, cloud computing, analytics and emerging scientific areas–such as nanomedicine and computational biology–to drive innovations that empower practitioners to focus their efforts on patient care.

IBM will focus its research on three main areas:
• Evidence generation, which uses scientific methods to use raw health data to help develop effective treatment methods, and then delivering it in a context-dependant and personalized way at the point of care;
• Improving service quality through simplifying the healthcare delivery process; and
• New incentives and models to shift the healthcare system to one that rewards based on patient outcomes rather than only treatment and volume of care.

Privacy and security of patient data and compliance with current healthcare regulations will be addressed throughout the new research initiative.