When I talk about digital healthcare, what a layman can imagine is beeping machines, floating heads in MRI, and a posh multi-screen computer screen plopping out of a specialist’s office right?
No! Wrong.
Digitalization of Healthcare is an entire movement. A revolution that our people are seldom informed about. Perhaps one of the most powerful outcomes of the pandemic.
Digitalization of healthcare is by far an incredible strategy for an advanced health ecosystem.
You must feel my words here are just gibberish with nothing making sense.
Let’s rewind a bit and starts from the basic.
What is Digitalization?
In simplest literal meaning;
Digitalization by Oxford’s definition is the conversion of text, picture, practice in a digital form; meaning something that can be easily processed by a computer.
In a traditional sense, improving businesses, practices, and opportunities through digital technologies. For our understanding of healthcare consumers, it is an umbrella term that uses E-health, telemedicine, and telehealth services using different communication mediums such as mobile devices and desktops.
The pandemic was a huge challenge to establish accurate, critical communication. This is where Digital Healthcare came into existence. From helping people seek medical help from the remotest areas of Pakistan to acquiring fast online blood tests result, the digitalization of healthcare in Pakistan created a traditional healthcare paradigm shift. Its further importance could be seen from the government’s immediate steps towards initiating an entire E-Health policy.
Apart from the pandemic, the rising healthcare reforms, terminal diseases, and urgency for medical help have created a pressure loop for the healthcare system. The shift towards a more sophisticated digitized form seemed like a probable approach.
The healthcare industry itself is a complex ecosystem of technology and human life. To keep these measures in check, the goals and need for a digital healthcare system had to be equally befitting in terms of complexity and diversity. From a standing view, these complexities look like;
- Fast-paced healthcare tools
- Low-cost healthcare services
- Target medicine
- Fewer doctor’s visits
- Increase average human life
Currently, several startups and initiatives are actively working in real-time for the adoption of advanced healthcare tools. Healthwire.pk has been such one startup that has actively worked in creating the latest healthcare management tools to help people all over the remotest areas of Pakistan. How have these tools played a critical tool in making this world a better place? Let’s have a look at the healthcare technology that is vividly developing our vision for a better future.
Digital Data Analytics
A big cry for data- help came when the only human-to-human interaction became restricted behind screens. Who got affected? Why are the symptoms so different? What about clinical trials? All answers to these questions relied on having a predictive technology tool using well-organized sorted data.
Just like any other third-tier country problem, Pakistan also lacked the proper resources and tools for having a good database to fall back to. The potential for data bias makes it hard for any statistic to be a reliable source. This challenge died with the conventional style of data filling. Soon bots and new advanced analytical tools got introduced that in return created a new framework for data filling and getting a grip on the national health crisis.
Smart Medical Devices
Oximeter, healthcare apps, video consultations, and digital health records, all were child innovations of a Digitalized Healthcare system.
We saw more patient engagement, more people motivated about their well-being, and a more renewed awareness of what we were putting on our plates. Through these devices, you could track your previous health records, and even analyze any risks involved.
Electronic health records and telemedicine has been two tremendous trends of this movement. Connecting patients to their records and having easy access to immediate medicine has improvised trust relationships in the healthcare sector. The responsibility for being at the forefront and translating data for an individual’s health has never been so rewarding.
Management Software
A turn of events happened, with more management systems emerging towards the mid of the pandemic. People liked their new taste of health technology and wanted to increase their engagement in whatever way they can.
These latest management software were not only more efficient than human intervention but also paved a way for optimum patient workflow. As a result? Patient engagement increased, doctors were able to practice better, organizations had a more sophisticated data set to and above all a sense of independence made these management software’s worthwhile.
Virtual Home Healthcare
Virtual healthcare brought more health agencies to the surface. Whereas, digitalization provided more opportunities for nursing professionals. The rising interest and need for at-home care created many different innovative reforms like ‘doctors on chat’, online follow-ups and consultations, at-home blood tests, and other test samplings. Surveys also showed how elderly individuals preferred their treatments from the comfort of their homes. Virtual-based healthcare would involve a different specialist in doctors all in the one-time loop to cater to an individual’s health need.
These reforms that we have witnessed in the past year are just the tip of the iceberg. What lies underneath lies a promising experience that is going to benefit each individual’s well-being in the coming decade. This new novelty proved to be reshaping new opportunities for better healthcare, research, data collection, and medicine expansion.
While the expansion of digital health trends has achieved some groundbreaking results. Pakistan is still struggling to find a stable footing in establishing AI, ML, and virtual reality-based tech creations within healthcare.
This is not to deny the small shifts that have been made. However, an early awareness This new novelty can further reshape new opportunities for better healthcare, research, data collection, and medicine expansion.
A New Era of a Revolutionized Healthcare…
In the coming decade, these platforms are going to not only reform our worldview on healthcare but also reduce our burdens in the sector. How I see this new revolutionary system would be a practice where patients would conform to their self-care in a much-informed manner.
If we all join hands today to acknowledge these new digital trends and step in line with the global healthcare system, we can without a doubt set our own accord of an improved healthcare system.
What we need today is your faith, your vision, and your resources for setting an unwavering pedestal of modern, standardized healthcare in Pakistan.
