Healthcare is an industry where data plays a critical role in patient care, research, and operational efficiency. Effective data management is essential for healthcare organizations to provide high-quality care and meet regulatory requirements. Medallion architecture offers a structured approach to data management that can address the unique challenges of the healthcare industry. This blog will delve into what Medallion architecture is and how it can be applied to the medical, healthcare, pharmaceutical, and life sciences industries. At MILL5, we understand our clients’ needs for data organization and management, and how certain data must remain private under compliance guidelines.
What is Medallion Architecture?
Since our last blog, let’s review what a Medallion architecture is. Medallion architecture structures data into three distinct layers: bronze, silver, and gold. Each layer serves a specific purpose in the data lifecycle, ensuring that data is ingested, transformed, and enriched in a systematic manner.
1. Bronze Layer: The raw data layer where data is ingested in its original form from various sources.
2. Silver Layer: The cleansed and transformed data layer where data quality issues are addressed, and the data is standardized.
3. Gold Layer: The enriched and aggregated data layer where data is optimized for business intelligence, advanced analytics, and reporting.
Medallion Architecture in Healthcare
1. Data Ingestion (Bronze Layer): Healthcare organizations collect data from a multitude of sources, including electronic health records (EHRs), medical devices, lab results, and patient monitoring systems. In the bronze layer, this data is ingested in its raw form, preserving the original details and ensuring completeness.
2. Data Transformation (Silver Layer): In the silver layer, data undergoes cleaning, normalization, and transformation. For instance, EHR data is standardized to a common format, lab results are validated, and patient data is de-identified to ensure privacy. This layer ensures that the data is reliable and adheres to industry standards.
3. Data Aggregation and Enrichment (Gold Layer): The gold layer focuses on aggregating and enriching data to create comprehensive datasets for various use cases. In healthcare, this could mean developing patient cohorts for clinical trials, creating predictive models for disease outbreaks, and generating operational dashboards for hospital management. The gold layer enables advanced analytics and AI-driven insights, improving patient care and operational efficiency.
Benefits of Medallion Architecture in Healthcare
• Improved Data Quality: Structured data layers ensure that data quality issues are addressed early, resulting in more reliable and accurate data.
• Enhanced Data Privacy and Security: By de-identifying data in the silver layer and implementing robust data governance, healthcare organizations can better protect patient privacy and comply with regulations like HIPAA.
• Scalability and Flexibility: Medallion architecture can scale to handle the growing volume and variety of healthcare data, from EHRs to real-time monitoring data.
• Faster Insights: Structured data layers enable quicker analysis and insights, supporting timely decision-making in patient care and operational management.
Medallion architecture provides a powerful framework for managing healthcare data, ensuring high data quality, enhanced privacy, and faster insights. By organizing data into bronze, silver, and gold layers, healthcare organizations can improve patient care and operational efficiency. To learn more about how MILL5 can establish a Medallion architecture for your organization, request a complimentary strategy session by clicking here.
In the next blog, we will explore how Medallion architecture can be applied to the manufacturing industry.
Medallion Architecture Example at Healthcare Company
