Emerging information technologies for enhanced healthcare Ji-Jiang Yang a,b , Jianqiang Li c, *, Jacob Mulder d , Yongcai Wang e , Shi Chen f , Hong Wu g , Qing Wang b , Hui Pan f a TNList, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China b RIIT, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China c School of Software Engineering, Beijing University of Technology, Beijing 100124, China d University of Groningen, Groningen, Netherlands e Institute for Interdisciplinary Information Sciences, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China f Department of Endocrinology, Peking Union Medical College Hospital, Beijing 100005, China g School of CS and Eng., University of Electrical Science and Technology of China, Chengdu 611731, China 1. Introduction Healthcare covers complex processes of the diagnosis, treat- ment, and prevention of disease, injury, and other physical and mental impairments in humans. The patients’ consumption of products and services provided by hospitals and other institutions forms the healthcare industry. The healthcare industry is especially fastest-growing part of the economy of many countries in modern society, not only the more economically developed countries like those in Western Europe and North America, but also in areas of high growth, such as China and India. The proper collection, management and utilization of health information play a critical role in detecting medical problems [5] and identifying innovative solutions and allocating resources [1] to treat patients. Information technologies are widely employed to improve the quality of healthcare services [4]. In the evolution of those improvements emerging technologies are not only used anymore for the general management of health systems, such as those in used in hospitals and clinics, but they are also focused on development and implementation of other solutions, such as those for rehabilitation purposes and for prevention, e.g. using serious gaming. Moreover, technologies are not solely used anymore for therapeutic purposes, but analysis using big data and cloud computing can reveal trends and can be used predictive medicine. Additionally, the enormous increase of the number and capabilities of sensors and smart sensor systems vastly increases the possibilities of generation and usage of data. Existing methodolo- gies for the detection and analysis of medical conditions can and will have to be revised and extended. In healthcare times are truly changing due to emerging information technologies. The enhancements that emerging information technologies offer are not only really necessary, but could not have come at a better time also. The cost relating to the demographic changes of an ageing population in industrialized nations is expected to place a significant burden on healthcare systems and economies [99,100]. In the near future the number of retired people (with an increased life expectancy [103]) will approach the number of working people worldwide [104] and the shrinking workforce will probably not be able to sustain the current level of support to elderly. This paper first surveys the emerging state-of-the-art informa- tion technologies for enhanced healthcare and tries to provide insight on how the developments in IT impact on healthcare Computers in Industry 69 (2015) 3–11 A R T I C L E I N F O Article history: Received 30 January 2015 Accepted 30 January 2015 Available online 20 February 2015 Keywords: Healthcare Health sensing Big data analysis Cloud computing Empowerment A B S T R A C T The appropriate collection and consumption of electronic health information about an individual patient or population is the bedrock of modern healthcare, where electronic medical records (EMR) serve as the main carrier. This paper first introduces the main goal of this special issue and gives a brief guideline. Then, the present situation of the adoption of EMRs is reviewed. After that, the emerging information technologies are presented which have a great impact on the healthcare provision. These include health sensing for medical data collection, medical data analysis and utilization for accurate detection and prediction. Next, cloud computing is discussed, as it may provide scalable and cost-effective delivery of healthcare services. Accordingly, the current state of academic research is documented on emerging information technologies for new paradigms of healthcare service. At last, conclusions are made. ß 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. * Corresponding author. Tel.: +86 13611239223; fax: +86 01067396242. E-mail address: lijianqiang@tsinghua.org.cn (J. Li). Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Computers in Industry jo ur n al ho m epag e: ww w.els evier .c om /lo cat e/co mp in d http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.compind.2015.01.012 0166-3615/ß 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.