No one can dispute technology’s ability to enable us all to live longer, healthier lives. From surgical robots to “smart hospitals,” the digital transformation is revolutionizing patient care in new and exciting ways. That’s not all. National health expenditures in the United States accounted for $3.2 trillion in 2015—nearly 18% of the country’s total GDP. It’s predicted that the digital revolution can save $300 billion in spending in the sector, especially in the area of chronic diseases. Clearly there is value—human and financial—in bringing new technology to the health care market. The following are just a few ways how.
Telemedicine Even back in 2015, 80% of doctors surveyed said telemedicine is a better way to manage chronic diseases than the traditional office visit. Why? Telemedicine offers patients and health care providers both a new wave of freedom and accessibility. For the first time, a patient’s care options are not limited by geographic location. Even patients in remote areas can receive the highest quality of care, providing they have an internet connection and smart phone. Telemedicine can also save both time and money. Patients no longer have to schedule their days around routine follow-up visits (and long office waits). Instead, they can hop on a conference call to get the prescription update or check-up they need. Nowhere has telepresence been more useful than in the mental health field. Now, those seeking emotional support can find access to a therapist or counselor at the click of a button, often for far less than they would pay for a full office visit. Internet therapies, for instance, “offer scalable approaches whereby large numbers of people can receive treatment and/or prevention, potentially bypassing barriers related to cost, location, lack of trained professionals, and stigma.” Telemedicine makes it possible.
Mobility And Cloud Access Have you ever played phone tag with your doctor while waiting for important test results? It’s so nerve-racking! That’s why mobility and cloud access have been such a tremendous help in increasing accessibility for patients and doctors alike. By 2018, it’s estimated that 65% of interactions with health care facilities will occur by mobile devices. Some 80% of doctors already use smartphones and medical apps, with 72% accessing drug info on smart phones on a regular basis. Gone are the days of paper charts and file rooms. Hospitals, insurance companies, and doctor’s offices are now storing patient medical records in the cloud, with patients able to access test results online 24/7. Given HIPAA laws relating to patient privacy, it’s probably no surprise this has also led to an increased focus on data protection and security. According to one report, “the black-market value of medical data is greater than even that of financial information.” Believe me when I say: No industry is more focused on virtualization security right now than health care.
Wearables And IoT I remember the days when going into the local grocery store and getting my blood pressure read at one of those prehistoric machines seemed exciting. Imagine: A machine that helped me manage my own well-being without setting foot in a doctor’s office. Now, mobile devices as small as my cell phone can perform ECGs, DIY blood tests, or serve as a thermometer, all without even leaving my house. With help from automation, patients can even be prompted to check their weight, pulse, or oxygen levels, and enter results into mobile patient portals. Even better: They can transmit the results to my doctor in real time. Those details, when entered regularly, can help predict one’s risk for heart disease and other illnesses, ultimately saving lives. This is far more than cool. It’s life-saving.
Artificial Intelligence & Big Data Big data is king in the digital world, and health care is no exception. Yes, it can be gathered to measure customer satisfaction. But perhaps more importantly, it can be used to automatically identify risk factors and recommend preventative treatment. Even more exciting: with the rise of the Internet of (Medical) Things (IoMT), mobile and wearable devices are increasingly connected, working together to create a cohesive medical report accessible anywhere by your health care provider. This data is not just useful for the patient. It can be pooled and studied en masse to predict health care trends for entire cultures and countries.
Empowered Consumers All of the above have led to an entirely new trend in healthcare: patient empowerment. While many of us have come to associate health care with high costs and long waits, patients are now in the driver’s seat, with better access to higher-quality doctors, and higher satisfaction rates overall. It’s a healthy new way to look at health care, and one that holds promise for all of us with easy access to the digital landscape. My blood pressure is already lowering just imagining the possibilities. Technology has disrupted every industry including healthcare, business, finance and others. Healthcare remains the fastest to adopt technological changes to revolutionize the diagnosis and treatment of the body. When we talk about the Internet of Things (IoT), it offers a multitude of benefits such as improving the effectiveness and quality of services by deploying it in medical devices. Have a look at few of the statistics revealing the use of IoT in healthcare and the overall impact on the industry. • Nearly 60% of healthcare organizations have introduced IoT devices into their facilities • 73% of healthcare organizations use IoT for maintenance and monitoring • 87% of healthcare organizations plan to implement IoT technology by 2019 which is slightly higher than the 85% of businesses across various industries • Nearly 64% use of IoT in the healthcare industry is patient monitors • 89% of healthcare organizations have suffered from IOT related security breach It has a widely known that interconnected devices are being used in such ways as gathering data from fetal monitors, blood glucose levels, electrocardiograms and temperature monitors. However, some of these tools require follow up communication with a healthcare specialist. Moreover, the majority of hospitals have invested in introducing smart beds to determine whether it’s occupied or not. When we talk about the Internet of Things, there are concerns regarding the data privacy and security. However, it doesn’t matter as far everyone is getting the right treatment, and the patients and doctors work in complete harmony. How healthcare industry can harness the power of IoT and set the stage for highly accessible, personalized and on-time healthcare services for everyone. Have a look at it.
Cutting Cost through Remote Health Monitoring The number one benefit of adopting IoT in a healthcare organization is cost reduction. Healthcare specialists can take advantage of remote health monitoring without the patient being present in the hospital. No matter, whether the patient is at home, in the office or some other part of the world, healthcare specialists can monitor the patient’s health and provide recommended treatments. Thus, it can reduce the workload of healthcare providers who can’t bear the flooding of patients each day. Moreover, the shortage of staff at medical health centers would never disrupt the checkup of patients. IoT can also be helpful in third world countries where health facilities are inaccessible. It can also be useful in areas hit by flood, earthquake, tsunami or hurricane. Overall, the impact of this technology will offer better health facilities, no longer specific to particular regions but globally.
Collecting and Understanding Medical Data During a patient’s stay, they are tangled in medical devices including heart monitors, blood pumps, respirators, and IVs. However, the operation and recording of information from these devices take a lot of time and are prone to errors on behalf of caregivers. Today, with IoT a patient’s data can be conveyed through Electronic Health Record systems automatically. This method helps in increasing the accuracy of data and allows nurses to spend more time providing care. On the other hand, doctors have to interpret data to decide the cure for patients. Due to the increase of medical devices, it can be challenging for doctors to come up with a proper diagnosis. For this, an IoT solution can be used to support health practitioners while combining IoT data from a multitude of medical devices and gain insights about patient’s health, without scattering the information.
Patient Monitoring The evolution of wearable health gadgets like the Apple iWatch has begun playing a pivotal role in the monitoring of an individual’s health. Still, these products are sometimes not as accurate compared to general medical equipment. On the other hand, wearable IoT devices can analyze and detect different health points such as blood pressure, heartbeat, brainwaves, temperature, physical position, footsteps and breathing patterns. With the help of data collected through IoT devices, doctors can share their feedback and give general suggestions in the case of an emergency. Although, the IoT is revolutionary in the healthcare sector, there are few challenges as well that needs to be kept in mind. Have a look at them.
Challenges of IoT Healthcare
Security Threats The primary concern for regulatory bodies is the security of Personal Health Information, stored and conveyed through connected devices. While many healthcare organizations make sure that the sensitive data is stored in a secure and encrypted manner, they do not have control over the safety and security of the data access points being used to transmit the data. This creates a significant threat that increases gradually based on the number of new devices connected to the network.
Multiple Device Integration Multiple device integrations is also an obstacle to the successful deployment of IoT in healthcare. Today most health devices and equipment within hospitals need to be connected to collect data of the patient. For instance, if a person is suffering from heart disease, he/she may be suffering from high blood pressure as well. The most prominent challenge is that device manufacturers have not agreed upon set of protocols and standards. As various mobile devices are connected to the network for the collection of data, the difference in protocols results in complicating the process of grouping the information. The lack of homogeneity among the medical devices reduces the successful implementation of IoT in healthcare.
Inferring Results from Immense Data The process of aggregating and collecting data is attached to many complexities. Though the combined data results can help in deriving new conclusions inferred from the patient’s record. However, coming up with the results from such a significant amount of data is quite challenging, without refined analytics program and data experts. Identifying valuable and actionable data is critical as most of the medical specialists and physicians find it difficult to conclude with the growth of data. The decision-making process with rapidly increasing data lacks quality. Moreover, the concerns are becoming bigger and bigger with the growth of some connected devices that continuously collect and generate big data.
Overcoming Obstacles for IoT in the Healthcare Industry There’s much talk about the opportunities for the Internet of Things (IoT) in the healthcare sector, and with good reason. Devices and sensors are already deeply embedded in clinical settings, and consumers are more connected than ever before, and becoming very comfortable using health and activity monitors. The result is an avalanche of rich data that can potentially be, and should be delivering benefits in terms of empowering patients, reducing costs, and improving patient care. But it’s not as easy as it sounds. The flip side of the coin is an industry struggling to overcome the obstacles it faces in adopting and realizing the benefits of digital technology. Long entrenched in politics and governance, where outdated legacy structures are impeding progress, the healthcare industry has a long road ahead. Some digital health advancements were recently described by one senior health leader as “the digital snake oil of the early 21st century.” That reference came from CEO of the American Medical Association (AMA), James L. Madara MD, speaking at a recent annual meeting. While Madara praised many technological developments, he went on to describe how, “Appearing in disguise among these positive products are other digital so-called advancements that don’t have an appropriate evidence base, or just don’t work that well—or actually impede care, confuse patients, and waste our time.” He’s got a point. So let’s take a closer look at the obstacles facing the health sector and what needs to be done to overcome them.
Securing Patient Data Security and privacy are issues are (or should be) top of mind when considering IoT technology. But in the highly regulated health sector, the bar is set even higher than for most other industries, creating challenges that CIOs in the commercial sector don’t face. Those providing healthcare services in the United States must meet the compliance requirements under the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA). Compliance is also required of app developers, hosting service providers, cloud computing service providers and anyone, including subcontractors, involved in the healthcare space who might in any way have access to electronic patient health information (ePHI). Healthcare is a highly regulated environment, breaches are inevitable and their causes varied. A quick glance at the HIPAA News Menu at the HHS website quickly reveals the scope of violations and the potential for health service providers to get it wrong; and the stringent penalties that can result. Also consider reports that the FBI and Homeland Security are concerned about the proliferation of IoT devices offering new points of entry to data systems, and you can see why privacy and security concerns are slowing progress. HIPAA isn’t likely to go away and the consequences of non-compliance can be high both in monetary terms and in reputational loss. As a result, there are no shortcuts for health service providers when collecting and managing patient data. Benefits will only be captured by finding the right tech partners, reading the small print, and ensuring the correct security and privacy controls are in place. That way, while progress might be slow, the obstacles can be overcome.
Control of Physical Devices As mentioned earlier, a scan of the HHS HIPAA News Menu contains many cases where the physical loss of a device has led to a breach of confidentiality. Those breaches can lead to very large fines.
When it comes to security breaches and protecting patient information, HHS isn’t fooling around—and the IoT and the rise of connected devices only makes that more complicated. Many of the organizations that suffered breaches demonstrated a failure of proper controls over physical devices. Effective control is critical to gaining patient confidence in the use of IoT in healthcare. Providers of services, and their associates, vendor partners, have a responsibility to ensure protocols are in place and their employees are trained to follow them.
Integration and Management of Multiple Devices Of course the health sector already uses an abundance of digital technology. IT systems, Electronic Health Records, clinical decision support tools, diagnostic tools, sensors, and monitors are found in all sorts of clinical and administrative settings. The problem is there are no common standards or communication protocols to facilitate the process of aggregating information from them. The proliferation of connected health and activity devices that many of us now use makes it easy to see why a lack of interoperability is a huge obstacle to progress. Health authorities in the U.S. recognize this is a situation that needs to change. Last year the Office for the National Coordinator for Health (ONC) released the final version of their Interoperability Roadmap, aimed at achieving their vision for a seamless data system by 2024. The ONC says that the roadmap will, “build upon and shore up the existing foundation of health IT, move quickly to short-term success, and also lay out a longer-term set of drivers and policy and technical components that will achieve the outcomes necessary to achieve the vision.”
Handling Big Data in Healthcare The healthcare sector generates massive amounts of data. Because of the proliferation of wearables and other consumer-owned devices, if our own patient-generated health data (PGHD) is to be introduced into a more integrated system, naturally the amount of data will expand exponentially. The challenge lies in deriving actionable insights from it. That will require powerful analytics and skilled data analysts—not necessarily assets that the healthcare sector is rich in right now. The key to progress is the same for the healthcare industry as it is for any other industry—the ability to filter through massive amounts of data and quickly determine what is useful and what is not, and then presenting the resulting information in a meaningful way, to the right person, at the right time. There is also the question of context and relevance, a question that technology developers haven’t yet succeeded in solving, but which AI and machine learning will probably play a role in. The consumerization of healthcare, where payment is tied to outcomes, will likely push providers a little more vigorously toward adopting big data tools and technology that allow greater personalization, the adoption of predictive analytics, and more sophisticated, more accurate information as a result.
The Future of IoT in Health I’m optimistic. There are good reasons to think the healthcare sector will overcome the obstacles and progress, albeit at a slower pace than in the commercial sector. • Governments are showing support with initiatives like the ONC roadmap. • Despite his skeptical comments Dr Madara also confirmed that his organization is taking positive steps to embrace IoT technology saying, “The AMA is building bridges to tech innovators and entrepreneurs so that physicians have a seat at the table as new products and services are being developed. This ultimately ensures new medical products address real-world challenges for physicians and patients to help improve the health of the nation.” • The Millennial generation, which has known nothing other than a super connected world, will increasingly fill senior medical practitioner and health administrator roles. • The Millennial patient base, a/k/a The Consumer (as well as their tech savvy counterparts from other generations) will increasingly demand better information, better processes, and more secure interfaces and privacy protections. All good things. The healthcare sector will get there—that’s a given. Digital transformation is not an option, it’s a reality. And driven by the IoT and other tech advances, patient expectations, and a society as a whole that relies on the healthcare industry in a myriad of ways, there’s simply no option but to strap on the seatbelts and resolve to embrace innovation and change. The outcome should be a healthcare system that delivers higher quality, more cost-effective care. Watch CNET's Next Big Thing panel – CES 2018, The Invisible Doctor This CES 2018 Supersession panel introduces you to the doctors, thinkers and luminaries from Verily (Google), United Healthcare, Doctor on Demand, Samsung and the Institute for the Future. We'll discuss an inspiring future in which our personal tech and health intersect. https://www.cnet.com/news/cnet-next-big-thing-ces-2018-panel-invisible-doctor/
Conclusion IoT will undoubtedly transform the health industry and the way patients are treated. Not only will it benefit doctors and other specialists, but people who have no access to the basic health facilities. Addressing few problems such as data security will revolutionize the health industry without breaching the privacy. Let’s embrace technology as a blessing instead of a curse and see what happens in the coming years.
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