My Quantifiable Self

When I was little, learning to count, ‘I’ was represented by lots of numbers; two eyes, ten fingers, one nose and so on.  As an adult I recognize that 'I' am made up of thousands of numbers. While I believe that my whole is greater than the sum of my parts I do not discount the tremendous value in understanding and quantifying those parts. But, my ability to measure is limited by my ability to access my personal data in a usable form.

The Quantified Self is a movement to incorporate technology into data acquisition on aspects of a person's daily life in terms of inputs (e.g. food consumed, quality of surrounding air), states (e.g. mood, arousal, blood oxygen levels), and performance (mental and physical).  There are devices and tools available to help us measure just about everything we do.  Nike+ is a great example of how devices can be used individually and contributes collectively.  I joined up online out of curiosity and all of my runs are added to the online calculator that keeps a tally of the ‘Nike community’ steps, calories and Nikefuel (Nike's way of selling more devices).  Think of how informative it would be if individuals shared their health data in the same anonymous way.

This week I encountered John Wilbanks on TED talks John Wilbanks: Let's Pool Our Medical Data and online at the Strata Rx Conference – Data Makes a Difference John Wilbanks: Choose Your Monopolies Wisely, and I was inspired by his belief in pooling medical data.  He goes beyond self interest in accessing data and believes that our data should be pooled (anonymously) to help find answers to our health challenges.

Wilbanks believes our health is the interaction of our bodies, our genomes, our environment and our choices and we can access data on all of these components to help us make informed decisions and be partners in the future of our health.  For those familiar with population health and the determinants of health you will be encouraged by his inclusion of so many measurable factors that impact the health of each and every one of us.  You will be nodding your head in encouragement as you listen to Wilbanks because you too recognize that improvements in health and health systems will not be found by keeping data in silos, but by looking holistically at all the factors that influence health.  Accessing and sharing that information is the first step.

It’s your health.  It’s your health information.  Manage it well.