I would like to use this space to tell you about our highly successful conference, “Big Data and Health: Implications for New Jersey’s Health Care System.” The line-up of speakers included the top minds in the field: health economists, technology innovators, medical practitioners, academic researchers, policy experts and government officials. Also impressive was our audience, whose questions propelled the conversation in exciting ways and whose tweets continued the dialogue beyond the room.

The conference, which we co-sponsored with the Woodrow Wilson School at Princeton University and The Nicholson Foundation, explored how “big data” is being used to fundamentally change the delivery of health care. Our full registration — we had to turn people away — showed the extraordinary interest in the field and the talent and expertise of our speakers.

At the end of the day I addressed the conference and recognized the incredible tools and capabilities we now have to pull large data sets together. I told the conference members that these awesome tools have the potential to drive improvements in health care, but only with their leadership. The great challenge, of course, is not generating data and hypotheses, but accessing the data, while handling it responsibly, and using it to drive the changes we must demand as a society.

These tools, I said, must be in the hands of enlightened craftsman, guided by creative architects, to redesign our health care system and achieve better outcomes for all of us. We need to ask: where do we want to go, and how can using the data get us there?

These tools, I said, must be in the hands of enlightened craftsman, guided by creative architects, to redesign our health care system and achieve better outcomes for all of us. We need to ask: where do we want to go, and how can using the data get us there?