Predictive health: the imminent revolution in health care

Increasing social, economic, and political pressures to reform the U.S. approach to medical care makes change likely. A fundamental premise of predictive health is that it should be cheaper (at least per person life-year) and more efficient and have a greater return on the investment of keeping people healthy as opposed to waiting for disease to intervene. The Emory Predictive Health and Society Strategic Initiative and its Center for Health Discovery and Well Being have embarked on a program to define health to the extent that modern science permits in the context of the entire human experience, to identify measurable variables that describe and predict a healthy state, and to use that knowledge to design health-focused interventions that are affordable and effective. Initial results from a study of a randomly selected "essentially healthy" cohort, using extensive assessments and a health partner, are promising. Studies of healthy aging over the entire life spectrum promise valuable normative data for age-specific assessments of health and the setting of realistic health goals.