Editorial
Digital Healthcare, the Next Game Changer
Though medical and scientific advancements cannot be unwarranted, it will be the upcoming digital offerings that would change the dynamics of the industry.
Clinically led improvement, enabled by new technology, is transforming the delivery of healthcare. Yet, strategic decisions about clinical transformation and the associated investment in information and digital technology can all too often be a footnote in policy making and budget allocation. This needs to change. The decisions need to move center stage.
On the demand side, digitally enabled care is no longer a ?nice-to-have, but rather a fundamental business imperative. Care givers believe the use of mobile devices help better coordinate care; physicians find that digital visits or e-visits could replace more than 10 percent of in-office patient visits and are comfortable relying on at-home test results to prescribe medication; and a large number of consumers have a healthcare, wellness, or medical app on their mobile device. The ecosystem is demanding technologies to support measurable, value-driven care.
The health ministry too has recently worked out a detailed e-health project under the Digital India initiative. It is developing a digital platform – an integrated health information platform -?to enable creation of inter-operable health record and is setting up National E-Health Authority as the statutory body for promotion and adoption of e-health standards. Currently, the Indian healthcare IT market alone is estimated at Rs. 6650 crore.
For healthcare, the next five years will be critical in linking data generated by these technologies with data from traditional systems and integrating that information seamlessly into clinicians’ everyday practice. Companies that have strategies that combine the right incentives, people, workflows, and data will emerge as leaders.
After years of wooing, it is high time that medicine and technology get married!
With constant product development by vendors, it becomes crucial to update the buyer. This annual edition of Buyers Guide offers a bird’s eye-view of the entire range of equipment and devices offered by leading vendors in each segment. It has been laboriously compiled, keeping in view that Medical Buyer is considered as the preferred source for Indian buyers seeking vendor and product information.
You must be logged in to post a comment Login