Month: April 2022

What is the Role of Technology in Healthcare?

Healthcare is a sector where there is great scope for technological innovation. Due to its essential nature, the healthcare industry is only going to grow, and the demand for technological solutions to refine healthcare systems and processes is only going to expand. In addition, new and exciting developments in fields like communications, data analysis, biotechnology, blockchain etc., can help hospitals and doctors provide the best and most efficient solutions to patients.

In this article, we’ll be discussing some of the emerging trends related to the role of technology in healthcare. 

Big Data Analysis

Due to the extensive increase in the need for medical facilities in recent days, integration of big data analysis in the healthcare industry has become very important. 

Due to extensive increase in need of medical facilities in recent days, integration of big data analysis in the healthcare industry has become crucial. Some of its applications are:

Efficient hospital staffing: By studying the past and present admission rates, hospitals can estimate the future admission rates. Based on this, they can take decisions as to how many staff to hire and which facilities they should be assigned to.

Error-proof medication: Data analysis systems can flag any errors or inconsistencies in the treatments or medicines assigned to the patient by studying patients’ medical history. This will be a failsafe against mistakes made by the hospital staff.

Preventive care: Again, by analysing patients’ medical history, systems can detect the early symptoms of any medical conditions so doctors can treat them before they reach the serious stage.

Wearable Medical Devices

Wearable medical devices like pacemakers, fitness trackers etc., are a burgeoning part of the healthcare market, and they are expected to form a 27 billion USD market by 2023. Examples of wearable devices are heart rate trackers, calorie trackers, oximeters and fitness trackers. These devices provide medical information about the patient in real-time and can provide advance warning of major health issues. 

Fitness trackers give the patient a sense of responsibility and give them control over their own health. Since they can directly see their activity level, they are encouraged to exercise more to reach some tangible goals. By adding rewards, alerts etc., these trackers “gamify” the fitness process and make it less of a chore for patients.

Virtual Reality Tech

Some doctors are using VR tech to provide relief to patients with chronic pain issues. Since pain is felt in the brain, distracting the brain with VR or other engaging tasks which require a high level of participation and interest from the patient can reduce their pain levels. 

Another application of VR tech is in reducing the anxiety levels of patients who are about to undergo surgery. By distracting the patients through virtual reality, doctors can take their thoughts away from the impending surgery, thereby reducing stress and anxiety levels and improving mental health and wellness.

Apart from helping patients, VR tech can help doctors hone their own skills. For example, doctors can rehearse complicated surgeries in virtual reality and get a better, immersive understanding of the internal arrangement of the human body, including even the smallest organs. 

Blockchain

Blockchain is a major milestone in the field of encryption technology and data security. Keeping the patients’ medical records secure and private is very important for healthcare facilities. This information must also be shared between hospitals when patients are transferred from one facility to another. Blockchain in the healthcare market is estimated to be worth almost 900 million dollars by 2023, showing that hospitals are starting to understand the value of this technology. 

Vendors like BurstIQ and Medicalchain are working to apply blockchain to the healthcare sector. They empower patients to have control over their medical records and are helping hospitals to store, organise and transmit patients’ medical information safely.

Telehealth

Telehealth and online medical consultations have come to the forefront of the healthcare sector due to the restrictions on in-person interactions imposed by the advent of the Covid-19. Even without the pandemic, telehealth comes as a boon to those patients living in remote or rural areas who can’t often travel to the doctor or patients with severe mobility issues (e.g. patients who use wheelchairs or patients suffering from neurodegenerative diseases) who can’t easily leave their houses to visit the doctor. 

Another use case is for patients suffering from contagious illnesses. Despite all the precautions that are taken, there is still the possibility of them spreading the disease. Again, telehealth can be used to treat these patients remotely.

Conclusion

Technology will definitely play an ever-increasing role in healthcare in this new digital age. From empowering people to ensure their fitness, protecting patients’ privacy and medical data, and helping hospitals make more efficient decisions vis a vis staffing and treatment, technological innovations can help doctors and patients in more ways than one.

iView Labs believes in bringing a better version of the healthcare industry at your call, we have a versatile team of developers and consultants to assist you to meet all the innovations you are planning for your healthcare business.

If you are interested in learning more about how to avail of these services, visit www.iviewlabs.com or write to us at sales@iviewlabs.com in case you have any queries. You can download our latest portfolio to get to know us better.

How Estonia is Creating Waves in the Field of Healthcare / How Estonia is teaching the world a lesson in digital health

Estonia has come to be known as a digital-first nation providing its citizens with solutions such as i-voting and e-residency. Furthermore, it has been in the vanguard of digitizing healthcare too. With a population of just 1,328,046, this small EU member is spearheading the digital healthcare phenomenon.

 A favorable place to do business, Estonia welcomes people from all walks of life, due to its agile methods and openness to innovations. It has become the playground for several tech tycoons and healthcare investors. Today, Estonia ranks first in the Digital Health Index with an incredible e-health score of 81.9. It set high standards for Electronic Health Record systems (EHRs) and the rest of the world is anticipated to soon follow suit.

The emergence of Coronavirus was a pivotal phase in Estonia’s Electronic Health Record systems (EHRs) coming to the limelight. While most countries struggled to cope with the outbreak, Estonia’s digital health record systems made it easier for medical practitioners to devote more time to help combat the deadly virus.

Let’s take a closer look at how Estonia is embracing digital life and paving the way for a more comfortable and convenient healthcare system. 

A national database of digital medical records
Almost all of Estonia’s hospitals and doctors have digitized their patient data, allowing citizens to access their medical records with relative ease. There are close to 40 million health documents in the e-Health system. This straightforward procedure has sparked interest, with Denmark and Spain following suit. The EHR system benefits both patients and doctors because it saves time and allows for quick and precise diagnosis.

E-ambulance service at your fingertips

Another advantage of the EHR system in Estonia is the availability of e-ambulance services, which detect the position of the person seeking aid within 30 seconds, resulting in a faster turnaround time for treatment.  It also provides the medical personnel to view the medical records of the patient they are about to save. This enables on-the-spot treatment depending on the person’s previous medical history.

Hassle-free e-prescriptions

Another important digital solution that Estonia has mastered is e-prescription. A warning notice is issued when a doctor recommends a prescription that may interfere with the current medication a patient is taking. The doctor can then recommend a different treatment to avoid side effects or any other potentially dangerous medical scenario. The technology also generates e-prescriptions, allowing patients to obtain re-prescriptions based on the doctor’s recommendations without having to visit the hospital.

EHRs a reality or a pipe dream for India?

In the healthcare sector, India is still developing and needs to speed up the digitization process. Public-Private Partnerships (PPPs) have become a crucial facet of healthcare, and the government is slowly but steadily looking into them to provide its residents with the best-in-class healthcare facilities.

There are various obstacles to overcome on the way to making EHR a reality in India. Here are a few: 

  1. An expensive affair
    Hardware, software, employee training, network fees, and maintenance can all seem a bit pricey in the beginning.
  2. Data leaks
    Indians are still hesitant to share their personal information because they believe that data leakage is a major worry.
  3. Data migration
    Converting data from paper to digital records is a difficult undertaking.
  4. Training of medical personnel
    Doctors will need to devote additional time to learning and adapting to the new system.
  5. Lack of technical guidance
    Another issue that private and small health facilities confront is a lack of in-house technical assistance to ensure that EHR systems work smoothly.

What can India learn? 

For the health record of any individual to be of clinical value, it needs to cover the various staged of life along with every clinical encounter that the person underwent throughout these stages.  It hence becomes critical for the records to be available, in a chronological order to provide a summary of the various healthcare events throughout the life of the patient. 

India is still in the early stages of implementing EHR systems. India can successfully integrate EHR systems in the future if it focuses on the following factors:

The PPP Way:  A higher level of public-private partnership is required to address infrastructure shortcomings in the healthcare delivery system. The commercial sector must be aware of public health issues, as these will have an impact on healthcare’s overall success. The private sector has the ability to bring in massive quantities of money to build world-class healthcare facilities for the general public. Simultaneously, the public sector can provide the necessary subsidies and accessibility. To attain universal health coverage and offer high-quality care at a reasonable cost, PPP employs a high volume, low margin strategy.

Personnel Training: Transitioning from legacy systems to newer ways of keeping records could be challenging in the beginning. Doctors and healthcare personnel must be properly trained in order to be able to leverage the advantages of this system. It may appear time-consuming at first, but in the long term, it will save time and provide a more open and simple manner of dealing with health issues.

Uniformity: In order to ensure health records across systems, organizations and institutions can seamlessly sync with each other, certain homogeneity is required in the way the records are stored. Guidelines have already been established by the Ministry of Health and Family Affairs, keeping in view the suitability and applicability in India. Institutions across the country need to ensure that they comply to these standards to be able to contribute towards the larger objective. 

Security: Maintaining high level of data security to ensure sensitive data of patients is protected is a must. Drawing parallels, there was a lot of resistance to online payments in the beginning, but once the security and privacy concerns are addressed, people have readily accepted digital as a preferred mode of payment. E-HRs will be a similar story. 

The pandemic served as a wake-up call for several countries including India. We are compelled to steer away from the conventional healthcare models to more unconventional ones. E-HR is the next power move promising to uplift the health conditions and healthcare experience of the general populace. From luxury, it needs to become a basic necessity. And to make it a reality, India as a country, needs to learn from many other countries and move at an exponential speed to emerge as a forerunner in the digital healthcare map.

To know more about iView Labs, kindly log on to our website www.iviewlabs.com and to get in touch with us with your queries and needs just write us an email on info@iviewlabs.com and sales@iviewlabs.com. Download the latest portfolio to see our work.