Embracing Innovations And Technologies In Healthcare
As we enter 2022, the world is witnessing a rapid transformation in the way individuals perceive health and wellbeing. This is due to the fact that healthcare as an industry itself is undergoing a complete modification with the help of massive advancements and innovations in technologies to further enhance this field. Owing to the COVID-19 pandemic, people have started viewing health as a state of well being rather than simply responding to illness.
The digital transformation in India has pushed a majority of the healthcare sector to provide access to individualised care on a mass scale. Previously, it would’ve been straight-forward to analyze how access to specialised healthcare was limited by finances and geography for a large number of people. Now, that in itself has been slowly changing with the advent of cheaper and more accessible alternatives through various digital mediums - be it online consultation applications or home-pharmacy solutions. Having a robust, round the clock digital healthcare system built with a government-supported digital framework is bound to change India’s health landscape.
Apart from that, the surfacing of the pandemic has brought around a greater need for easier and home-driven health solutions. Home devices like the Oximeter, Sphygmomanometer and Glucometer are more popular and required than ever before, so it can be deduced that the healthcare sector is headed towards more customary, homebound solutions for the general public in the near future. It can also be hoped that the digital wave does bring about a more personalised approach to health. Fitness applications are becoming common and health tracking devices are getting cheaper. AI and Machine Learning techniques have started to determine very customised profiles for individual health. Therefore, the future of the entire industry seems headed towards a person-to-person, driven approach. Demands of investment in the industry seem to be leading up to that drive and the areas of focus are readily visible now.
The need of the hour is cost-effective, mass-scale solutions that reach as many people as possible. The same way in which a Glucometer is home-driven now more than ever before, so are other solutions of common medical problems. Preventive healthcare in the country is taking shape and the investments in the industry seem to be following suit. Healthtech startups with cost-effective, consumer-driven health solutions are gaining investments and admiration. Helping a doctor’s cause to recognise at-risk persons at the earliest makes healthcare more universal, but there is a huge gap that needs to be fulfilled.
Adding on, increased investments in smarter solutions for public safety are needed. At the same time, an increased expenditure in making such solutions accessible and readily available to everybody is just as crucial. Recognising and promoting indigenous players in the healthtech industry is important, especially during these unprecedented times. The pandemic has presented the need for a streamlined diagnostics market, considering that a lot of public movement is still determined by reports such as the RT-PCR. Kit-making and availability is another challenge that could determine how the course of investment into the healthcare sector is charted. Improvement in hospital infrastructures, training and quality assurance are finding better feet while a futureproof, post-pandemic idea of healthcare still needs to find its ground. That being said, the pandemic has pointed out the inequities that have long existed in India’s health space. We realise that public health is for the public at large and that includes every citizen of India, notwithstanding their economic status. The government needs to rope in more private players in the existing healthcare system. India, being the second-fastest adopter of digital services in the world with half a billion internet users, has immense economic potential.
This is where the team at Skinzest is presenting themselves as a major carrier of change in the field of dermatology. Contemporary lifestyles and climate change are presenting new dermatological issues that would need addressing at the shortest. Through a push to digitise, Skinzest is helping create awareness among a larger crowd for immediate skin healthcare. By using facilities such as AI models of computation that make a timely diagnosis and further treatment of skin problems easier, actions are slowly futureproofing the approach to dermatology. This would also allow a sincerely personalised skin profile for each individual, thereby making it easier to access skin health records and understand personal issues.
Mixing the digital approach can help address the issues of availability, affordability and quality. Such a health system also fits in with the missions like the Ayushman Bharat and Make in India. Technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) can help India run closer to the goal of digital health for all.
The push into, teledermatology is set to reach a broader audience that needs skincare and is still unsure of who to approach. Dermatology as a field of study is yet to reach every nook and corner, but it is steadily revolving into reaching that outcome. Indian households still tend to favor home remedies instead of visiting a dermatologist, but teledermatology is gradually mending that perception. With social distancing and isolation, routines have been disturbed. Skincare professionals like the team at Skinzest have meticulously crafted online skin-care programs that are helping people focus on skin health. This regime is designed not only to diagnose major problems, but also to educate and assist people along their skin-health journey. These programs are driving the conversation away from just home remedies and are bringing the opinions of medical professionals to the forefront.
Dermatologists are a pivotal part of the healthcare ecosystem, consistently involved in striving to change lives with existing technology and readily adopting newer technologies. The future of dermatology has extensive applications of health-tech, considering the technologies for the treatment of scars, burns and pigmentation are evolving and constantly improving. Even with age-old issues like hair loss and hair transplant, an increase in the funding of their technology might result in them becoming a thing of the past.
At the end of the day, prevention is better than cure. The reason it has been believed time and again is understandable. Preventive healthcare is the need of the hour. Anything that helps doctors guide someone to betterment before they need to, becomes essential. This is exactly where the healthcare policy of this nation and the entire world is heading. This is also what our policy-makers should focus on. Access to cheaper and more involved technology is already shaping the way we live our daily lives. Data-driven technology is bound to generate our medical profiles, interim recognising our issues before they take shape and playing a dominant role in shaping the future of healthcare as preventive, rather than urgent.
The healthcare industry is expanding exponentially in Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities. Now is an appropriate time for the state and corporate collaboration to create not just better infrastructure for hospitals in these cities, but even funding pharma research and development, creating centers and laboratories, therefore making these cities the epicenters for change. The quality of healthcare that is reaching these cities needs to be ensured and by a greater drive for R&D, the healthcare industry can be an active sector providing employment generation and logistical overhaul while contributing to the overall financial and quality of life development of these cities. This mitigates the gap between the inequities that are so readily at display due to the pandemic, now more than ever before.
This can only be supported by a drive towards digitisation along with a careful yet steady adoption of technology. The course of action to achieve the outcome of total digitisation in the healthcare industry is already making waves. Therefore, it must be ensured from the policy level that the safety of upload and management of patient data across multiple hospitals, clinics and diagnostics centres is ensured and readily enacted. It is only when hospitals, through the use of fundamental digitisation, provide a clear and concise medical profile of every single citizen of the country and act as carriers of awareness about the adoption of such technologies, can the country truly move forward into the future. Medical profiles when studied through modern techniques such as AI over years will help determine not only individual health, but the health of many generations to come. It is indeed possible to shape tomorrow, through our efforts today.
To conclude it all, the future of healthcare will largely depend upon how well healthcare workers and technological advancements compliment each other. It is vital for medical professionals to embrace the emerging innovations and technologies to remain relevant and be able to provide optimum level of care to the patients.
