Healthcare Data Migration from an On-premises Data Lake to Databricks on Azure

Client

US Healthcare Administrator

Our client is a leading US third-party administrator delivering healthcare solutions for self-funded health plans and carriers nationwide, serving millions with a large global team.

Challenge

On-premises Data Lake in Healthcare IT

For years, our client—a leading healthcare administrator—was driven by a mission to deliver better care and innovative solutions to their members. Yet, as their business grew and the healthcare landscape evolved, they found themselves increasingly constrained by the very systems that once supported their success.

Imagine a team of passionate healthcare professionals, eager to launch new digital health initiatives, streamline patient data sharing, and respond quickly to regulatory changes.

Instead, they found their efforts slowed by an on-premises data lake infrastructure that simply couldn’t keep up. The systems’ limitations were befuddled with technical inconvenience—they were a barrier to innovation, making it difficult to adapt to the rapidly changing needs of patients and providers.

In healthcare, the ability to innovate is essential for improving patient outcomes, addressing health equity, and responding to industry challenges like rising costs and workforce shortages. Our client needed to solve the following challenges:

• Scalability & Data Volume: Legacy systems can’t keep up with growing patient data, limiting trend analysis and real-time care personalization.
• Fragmented Ownership: Data silos from multiple business groups hinder care coordination, raise costs, and risk patient safety.
• Security & Data Quality: Weak security and poor data quality threaten compliance, trust, and care improvements.
• Innovation Barriers: Outdated healthcare IT infrastructure slows adoption of digital tools, affecting care coordination and addressing critical health issues.

These challenges were impeding the healthcare organizations’ ability to adapt to patient needs, implement new care models, and comply with evolving regulations—ultimately affecting patient outcomes and community health.

Solution

Migrating to Databricks on Azure for an Enterprise Data Platform

Recognizing the challenges of legacy systems—like limited scalability and fragmented data—we work closely with clients to develop practical strategies for moving to more flexible, cloud-based platforms.

Modernizing the US healthcare company’s data infrastructure was needed to better meet today’s demands. We helped them migrate with a structured data landscape assessment and industry-specific data strategy for on-premises data lake modernization to Databricks on Azure.

Starting with a careful review and rationalization of existing workspaces, we used a structured approach to move Hadoop data smoothly to Databricks. By redesigning processing tasks with PySpark and Spark SQL, we improved both performance and scalability.

The new setup, built on Databricks, Delta Lake, and Databricks SQL, provides a solid foundation for managing data more efficiently.

This cloud data migration supports the client’s goal of unifying data and improving care delivery through better insights. With a more modern platform in place, they are better positioned to adapt to changing patient needs and regulatory requirements. Our partnership reflects a practical step forward in helping healthcare organizations use data more effectively.

Benefits

The migration delivered transformative benefits for the client, enabling them to operate more efficiently and effectively:

• Cost Savings: By optimizing compute resources, the client achieved a 15% reduction in client costs and overhead, allowing reinvestment in other critical business areas.
• Improved Processing: Streamlined data processing from source to consumption workspaces resulted in faster, more reliable insights, empowering confident data-driven decisions.
• Enhanced Data Governance: Better access control on consumption workspaces increased data value while ensuring security and compliance.

Summary

Positioning for Future Success in Healthcare

By migrating to Databricks on Azure, they not only overcame the limitations of their legacy systems but also positioned themselves for long-term success.

With a scalable, secure, and efficient data and healthcare IT infrastructure in place, the organization is now better equipped to serve its members and clients and deliver high-quality healthcare solutions.