In the last two years, the pandemic has accelerated the digitization of the healthcare industry, fight illness, develop medicines and vaccines. The HIMSS future of Healthcare report has claimed nearly 80% of the healthcare providers plan to increase investment in technology and digital solution for the next 5 years. Leading to the growth in areas of telemedicine, personalized medicine, wearables, sensors, genomics, AI & machine learning, cloud computing, external reality, and the internet of things (IoT).
Dropping our predictions for the 5 biggest Digital Healthcare trends for 2022:
- Metaverse in Healthcare
Metaverse is holding new possibilities in healthcare that combine the technologies like AI, Virtualreality, Augmented reality, Web 3.0, Internet of Medical Devices, intelligent cloud, edge, and quantum computing with robotics. The components of Metaverse in Healthcare are – Gamification to connect healthcare providers and consumers; use of virtual reality in medical training; and utilizing augmented reality for surgical procedures.
- Telemedicine and remote healthcare
During the first few months of the outbreak, the online healthcare consultation shot up from 0.1% to 43%. The analysts at Deloitte found most of the users were happy and continued to use telemedicine. The increase in demand for new generation wearable technologies enabled healthcare professionals to monitor and access health data and vital signs in real-time. Further leading to the establishment of Virtual Hospital wards and Virtual ER.
- The extended reality for clinical training and treatment
Extended reality (XR) includes Virtual reality (VR), Augmented reality (AR), and Mixed Reality (MR). Each having specific functionality like VR headsets is used for training doctors and surgeons that allows them to acquaint to work in the human body without putting the patient at risk. VR is utilized as therapy for children with autism, facilitates CBT to assist with chronic pain, anxiety, and schizophrenia. The AR application, for example, AccuVein helps doctors and nurses to locate veins by detecting heat signature of blood flow and highlightings on patients’ arms. Another AR application, the Microsoft HoloLens system is used in surgical theatres to let the surgeon receive real-time information and share their views on what they are seeing to other professionals and students.
- Medical data with AI and machine learning:
Current trends for the use of AI in the health sector revolves around augmenting and training medical professionals. Telehealth providers like Babylon health use AI chatbots to gather information on symptoms and direct inquiries to the right medical healthcare professionals. In upcoming years AI will deeply impact preventive medicine, such as aiming to predict where and when the illness will occur and provide solutions in advance. These can be in the form of prediction of outbreaks, hospital readmission rates, lifestyle factors, and environmental impacts. AI helps to create tools that can spot patterns on huge datasets far more effective than traditional analytics leading to more accurate predictions and better patient outcomes.
- Genomics-
Genomics is the study of genes. The recent use of technology to map individual genomes is helpful for creating personalized medicine for serious diseases like cancer, arthritis, and Alzheimer’s disease. Implementation of modern technology such as genomics, AI, and digital twins helps to personalize treatment which can be tailored right down to the individual level. For example- the drug company Novo Nordisk has teamed up with digital health company Glooko to create personalized diabetes monitoring tools that provide bespoke recommendations for exercise, diet, illness management, and blood sugar reading.
Read more about digital healthcare and event coverages – Top 3 things to watch out in digital health at WEF22, Latest update: Health Tech in CES 2022 .
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