How Rambam Turns your Medical Data into Better Care
October 13, 2026 – At Rambam Health Care Campus (Rambam), clinicians, researchers, and technology specialists are exploring how to turn medical information into tools that improve treatment while protecting patient privacy.
The challenge is to ensure that patients benefit from these advances and have confidence in how hospitals use their medical information.
Decades of digital medical records are helping Rambam develop AI tools to predict patient deterioration, improve treatment, and advance research. Intensive care monitoring systems collect vital information, while wearable devices generate additional health information beyond the hospital. In the AI era, these growing datasets offer valuable opportunities for research, innovation, and clinical care.
"The most valuable asset in a major hospital is no longer necessarily its MRI machine, surgical robot or new inpatient building, but the information generated during every medical encounter," says Dr. Michal Mekel, Rambam's Director General. "Laboratory results, imaging scans, diagnoses, treatments, medications and clinical developments accumulate over the years into a database of enormous value for research, drug development and artificial intelligence."
Dr. Danny Eytan, Director of the Wagner-Green Pediatric Intensive Care Unit, explains that analyzing data from children treated over the past twenty years could help identify children whose condition is likely to deteriorate. Such tools could allow clinicians to intervene earlier. In his view, choosing not to use information that could benefit the next patient is not a neutral decision.
Continuity of care between Israel’s hospitals and health plans provides a comprehensive view of patients. However, data alone is not enough. Clinicians must apply their expertise to interpret it and help develop practical tools. Collaboration with technology companies in Haifa and northern Israel also provides a foundation for medical advances.
Hagar Trau, Head of Rambam’s Digital and Information Technologies Division, explains that protecting patient trust requires safeguards and oversight. Teams use medical information within approved, controlled environments at the hospital and the Ministry of Health, with privacy protection guiding the development of new tools.
The challenge is to protect sensitive information while enabling research that could benefit patients. Eytan points out that people routinely share highly sensitive, identifiable information with commercial companies through digital platforms, often without considering how those companies will use it. Medical data requires careful protection, but its potential benefits also deserve consideration.
What will define medicine in the next decade? How will big data shape patient care, and which new technologies will bring hope to patients around the world? Medical and technology experts, academics, and medical industry leaders will explore these questions at RAMBAM TOMORROW, the joint Rambam–ynet innovation conference on Wednesday, October 14, 2026.
