When Data Is A Matter Of Life Or Death

Not long ago, a colleague clapped me on the back as we were leaving the office. "It's been a good day," he crowed. "No one died." He was kidding and to make a point: Don't take work too seriously when the stakes aren't mortal.

But what if they are? As they are for Ash Damle, the 35-year-old founder of an about-to-be launched, cloud-based, big data healthcare analytics company called MEDgle.

Because MEDgle could make the difference between life and death, I found myself pestering Damle for details. I discovered what it takes to collect copious amounts of raw data from obscure journals and exotic databases and create sophisticated probability algorithms, while making it useful to help nurses, doctors and others diagnose, triage, and treat flesh-and-blood people.