Healthcare is becoming part of information technology.

Hear the words of Bill Maris, a builder of visions and a herald of the future, who proclaimed: “Healthcare is becoming part of information technology.” In this declaration lies not a mere observation, but a prophecy of transformation. For what once belonged to the realm of physicians’ hands, of stethoscopes and scalpels, now merges with the realm of information, of data, of algorithms, and of machines that learn. The healing of bodies and the guarding of life are no longer separated from the streams of knowledge that flow through wires and servers—they are bound together, forming a new age of medicine.

The origin of this wisdom is found in the rising tide of the digital revolution. Once, healthcare was a practice rooted in the art of the healer, passed from master to apprentice, guided by observation and tradition. Yet as the centuries unfolded, science clothed healing in precision, and in our own time, technology has clothed it again in data. The patient is no longer only a body of flesh but also a constellation of numbers: heartbeats counted, genes sequenced, images scanned, histories stored in vast digital vaults. Maris saw clearly that the future of healing lies not apart from information technology, but within it.

History itself offers glimpses of such transformations. When the printing press spread across Europe, physicians no longer hoarded knowledge in secret manuscripts—books carried medical learning across borders, multiplying healing hands. Later, the microscope revealed invisible worlds of germs and cells, forever altering how man understood sickness. Now, in our day, the computer becomes the new instrument, magnifying the healer’s vision not through glass but through data. It is the same story retold: when knowledge finds a new vessel, healthcare itself is reborn.

Consider the Human Genome Project, completed in the dawn of the 21st century. It was not accomplished by physicians alone, nor by biologists alone, but by the marriage of biology and computing power. Millions of fragments of DNA were deciphered not by the naked eye, but by machines and algorithms. Out of this union came a new chapter: medicine that looks not only at symptoms but at the very code of life. Here the words of Maris ring true: healthcare and information technology are no longer strangers, but companions walking hand in hand.

Yet this merging is not without trial. For when healthcare becomes entangled with technology, questions of justice, privacy, and power also arise. Who owns the data of the body? Who commands the algorithms that decide treatment? Just as fire can warm or destroy, so too can this marriage heal or harm, depending on the wisdom with which it is guided. Maris’s saying is therefore both hopeful and cautionary—it points to the dawn of miracles, but also warns of shadows that must be faced with vigilance.

The meaning of his words, then, is that the art of healing can no longer be thought of as separate from the science of data. The physician of tomorrow must also be a student of information, for the future patient is both body and code, both pulse and pattern. To ignore this union is to fall behind; to embrace it is to open the gates of new cures and longer lives.

The lesson for generations is this: be ready to walk between two worlds. Cherish the human touch, the compassion of the healer’s hand, but also learn the power of the digital mind, for in their union lies the medicine of the future. Do not resist change, but shape it with wisdom and justice, ensuring that the gift of technology serves life rather than diminishes it. For as Maris declared, healthcare is becoming part of information technology, and the wise will see in this union both the challenge and the promise of a new age of healing.