Growth of Digital Healthcare in the Era of Smart Cities

The future is going to be about the Internet of Health and each user will be generating 1 TB worth of health data every year. No human can possibly analyze or make sense of this data.

By Vishal Gondal

We are at the cusp of a boom in Healthcare technology. The scope is broadening every day and so are the opportunities. Government policies like the National Digital Health Mission (NDHM), Guidelines for Telemedicine 2020, and E-pharmacy Rules have set the ball rolling for digital healthcare in India.

From heart rate monitors built into watches to glucose monitors integrated into contact lenses, the healthcare industry is heading into some interesting and revolutionary times. Just as in fintech where startups sprang up and eventually overhauled the system through digitization, the healthcare space will see a revolution. Adopting technology with prevention, diagnosis, and treatment will get us close to the goals of digital health. Technology has already led to paradigm shifts in healthcare from a ‘sick-care’ model to a preventive or wellness-based model.

Let’s take a quick look at the opportunities and challenges.

Opportunities

• Digital health offers the ability to help individuals monitor and manage chronic illnesses while also preventing diseases and lowering healthcare expenses.
• It personalizes medicine for each patient.
• Doctors, nurses, therapists, or nutritionists, get immediate and dependable access to the patient’s information.
• A digital health system tool such as Electronic Medical Records (EMRs) digitizes patient information from various sources, helping doctors make an accurate prognosis in a shorter time.
• Telemedicine can reduce the time it takes to consult a doctor in both rural and urban areas by avoiding the need to travel.
• Wearables can enable healthcare consumers to analyze their biomarkers, receive digital coaching services and benefit from their insurance plans.
• Artificial intelligence (AI) is poised to become a transformational force in healthcare.
• With AI, large amounts of datasets can be analyzed and patterns found at scale. Learning algorithms can become more precise and accurate as they interact with training data, allowing humans to gain unprecedented insights into diagnostics, care processes, treatment variability, and patient outcomes.
• The future is going to be about the Internet of Health and each user will be generating 1 TB worth of health data every year. No human can possibly analyze or make sense of this data. Only with AI can we use this to build personalized therapies.
• More accurate data flow, allows individuals to get better insurance covers. Insurers will be able to develop closer relationships.
  
  

  

Challenges

• Affordability and Accessibility can be a concern. Services cannot be spread proportionately to distant locations. Without financial ability rural/remote access to healthcare is difficult.
• There is a need to incentivize the adoption of digital health for public and private healthcare providers. In western countries telemedicine, hospital information systems (HIS), and electronic medical records (EMRs) are adopted as part of an overall healthcare delivery system.
• There is a need for strong Data Privacy laws. Health data can be misused in the absence of a robust data protection law. Hence, a strong data security architecture needs to be built and put in place. Healthcare technology firms have to exercise significant care when collecting, processing, and storing personal health data. While sharing health data may be the key to medical innovations, checks and balances with clear guidelines on accountability need to be created.

Vishal Gondal is Founder & CEO, GOQii

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