Our High-Tech Health-Care Future

[Commentary] We are in the early phases of the next big technology-driven revolution, which I call “consumer health.”

When fully unleashed, it could radically cut health care costs and become a huge global growth market. Imagine a transformation in which advances in information technology, biology and engineering allow us to move much of health care out of hospitals, clinics and doctors’ offices, and into our everyday lives. It would begin with a “digital nervous system”: inconspicuous wireless sensors worn on your body and placed in your home would continuously monitor your vital signs and track the daily activities that affect your health, counting the number of steps you take and the quantity and quality of food you eat. Wristbands would measure your levels of arousal, attention and anxiety. Bandages would monitor cuts for infection. Your bathroom mirror would calculate your heart rate, blood pressure and oxygen level. Then you’d get automated advice. Software that could analyze and visually represent this data would enable you to truly understand the impact of your behavior on your health and suggest changes to help prevent illness — by far the most effective way to cut health care costs.

[Moss is an entrepreneur and former director of the M.I.T. Media Lab]