If digitalization is optimal for the healthcare industry?
Digitalization has proved its efficiency advantage in many industries’ evolutions. However, people seem to be ambivalent when it comes to digital healthcare. This article provides an overview of the current healthcare situation and discusses whether digitalization is the optimal solution for the healthcare industry.
Since the Coronavirus pandemic 2019, people have become more conscious about the healthcare system and the solutions to make the healthcare sector more efficient and sustainable. For all the debates, criticisms, and solution suggestions to be meaningful, the current healthcare situation must be thoroughly ascertained.
Healthcare situation
The year 2020 has almost had the world checkmated by the Covid-19 pandemic. Its ongoing escalation has emphasized and expanded the needs of digital healthcare technologies. But digitalization is still a headache for most countries’ healthcare systems because of the information sensitivity. Meanwhile, some already have one step ahead.
Doctors in Sweden, Denmark, and Estonia send prescriptions electronically to the patient or straight to the pharmacy that delivers the medication. The future is bright, and there’s no time to hum and haw. Following the digital flow, German healthcare industry actors have placed the Digital Healthcare Act (DVG) in force.
The action brings hope to the public. Many believe that digitalization can solve the COVID-19 relating problems and other existing problems in the healthcare industry.
“It’s time to move from reactive sick-care to proactive healthcare by default”
— Koen Kas, Healthcare futurist & Delight thinker
Challenges to face
The problems come from both healthcare suppliers and healthcare receivers. Inefficient spending is one of the biggest headaches of the healthcare industry’s stakeholders. The pandemic is undoubtedly not the only one to blame. Financial inefficiency, regulatory burden, and operative difficulties also represent the factors that drive costs in this industry.
The drivers of healthcare spending growth can also be found in the developed countries ‘age trend, which accounts for most global spending. On the healthcare receivers’ side, losing time caused by the unavailability of appointments and increasing suffering for people who need medical attention is one of the standard issues driving frustration and disappointment of the healthcare system.
The burden does not stop. The COVID-19 pandemic has pushed the worldwide population health on edge, causing many restrictions on the physical connection, and isolation requirement.
These are standard healthcare issues, which leave no country untouched. Like other counterparts, Germany and struggles to meet the civils’ demand and relieve the bear on its healthcare infrastructure and personnel (Infographic: German’s healthcare — Facts and figures).
To overcome the challenges, a handful of Acts have been adopted. One of those is The Digital Healthcare Act (DVG), which boosts Germany’s healthcare system digitally one step further.
The COVID-19 pandemic has pushed the health of the worldwide population on edge
Why is digitalization an optimal solution?
“Digitalization of healthcare refers to the integration of information technology with medical knowledge and practice to improve medical care.”
— Maximilian C., Wilfried (2020)
Digitalizing the healthcare system is the essential element for the inefficiency problem to be solved. Only the digitization of data and switching the whole system into paperless can account for up to nine billion Euros’ potential value.
Automation and online interaction seem to have significant impacts on the disburdening shortage of medical and clinical workforce. Besides, digitalizing healthcare will not only massively and directly increase efficiency but also prompt improvements in care, at least equivalent to the value of the direct gains in efficiency.
As for the Coronavirus outbreak, the implementation of digitals helps prevent the physically direct interaction in the clinics and hospitals. But the potential does not stop at maintaining the workflow. Digitals can accelerate all the medical services functions without the risk of virus cross-infection¹.
Digitals also helps home-based healthcare, and delivering sample and test result becomes more efficient due to the elimination of transportation cost.
Not only solving the existing healthcare problems, but digitalization also opens a new chapter of medical analysis and diagnosis.
The pandemic has made it clear that data is crucial to make a decision appropriately. Big data and real-time data also state a significant role in medical analytics and efficiency in solving the future healthcare crisis.
Top funded digital health categories worldwide in 2020
- Telemedicine
- Data analytics
- mHealth apps
- Clinical decision support
- Practice Management Solutions
- Wearable sensors
- Wellness
- Healthcare booking
- Social health network
In other words, digitalization and the use of the latest technologies will bring substantial improvements in many respects to how people receive medical treatment in the future.
For these reasons, digitalization is the key to resolve the nationwide healthcare problems Germany is dealing with. But digitalization is still a vague term without a grounded digital strategy. To make the quantum leap, healthcare needs a modern, data-integrated platform² that can handle digitalization.
With that platform, the patients’ real-time data and the treatments can be digitized for AI technology to generate insights. Although AI technology is powerful at predicting and fulfilling the data holes, patients’ real-time insights still hold the highest priority in telling a more complete story about patient’s health. Above all, a sustainable industry is a human-centric industry.
In our second blog “Is digital within the healthcare sector truly profitable or just a marketing trick?”, we reveal if digitalization truly deliver profit or is just nothing more than a marketing trick in the healthcare industry.
(1) Virus cross-infection: the transfer of harmful microorganisms, usually bacteria and viruses. The spread of infections can occur between people, pieces of equipment, or within the body.
Source: Kristeen Cherney at www.healthline.com
(2) Data-integrated platform: A modern digital platform that strong and comprehensive enough to handle the healthcare digitization.
Source: Health Catalyst Editors
Digital/McKinsey (2018), Digitizing healthcare — opportunities for Germany.
Maximilian C., Wilfried (2020), The Digitalisation of Healthcare.
Edelmann S. (2019), 7 ways digitization will shape the future of healthcare.
Health Catalyst Editors (2018), The Digitization of Healthcare: Why the Right Approach Matters and Five Steps to get There.
