Tech enabled Out-of-hospital care

Healthcare ecosystems around the world are grappling with the long-standing issue of affordability. According to a recent survey, 58% of adults worldwide cannot afford good healthcare as of 2021. According to a World Health Organization and World Bank report, healthcare costs have forced more than 100 million households into economic hardships.Furthermore, the COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the challenges to healthcare in terms of affordability and social inequity. It has also emphasized the importance of easily accessible, value-based care. As a result, there has been a significant increase in the adoption of digital health solutions.

Meeting patients' needs through innovation care

India's economy is currently booming. We are making up for years of underdevelopment, ignorance, technology, and resources. Globalization, the internet, and technological advancements have altered the face of several industries in the country, including healthcare. During the Covid pandemic, technology served as a sort of utopia. The solutions provided have changed the perspectives of patients, healthcare professionals, and regulators. Indeed, the world quickly realized that, aside from treating Covid patients at home, there is enormous potential in a wide range of other situations. Healthcare is now available outside the four walls of a hospital!

In that sense, technology is almost everywhere, and it is assisting in addressing India's unique challenges in terms of accessibility, affordability, and reliability. Though it is still in its early stages, the rate of adoption is quite rapid, and given the size of the healthcare sector, the scale and impact can be enormous. A number of trends have emerged in the Indian healthcare sector that are utilizing cutting-edge technology to simplify and improve the patient's experience.

Here’s how tech-enabled solutions are changing the healthcare landscape

Even the country's medical insurance policies have switched to cash - free and electronic payments, removing many of the inconveniences that patients previously faced. Digital payments and automated micro-credit are already in use, while blockchain and AI-powered payment gateways are still in the planning stages.

Adoption of electronic health records (EHRs), for example, is another key trend for improving care, reducing errors, and making clinical care processes more cost-effective. Cloud solutions and mobile apps that integrate provider and patient interactions are increasing EHR implementation. Other game-changing technologies, such as augmented reality, virtual medicine, 3D printing, and the internet of things, are already making inroads into equipment, personal wearables, telemedicine, immersive training and education, simulation, and so on. Indeed, technology is rapidly being integrated into every stage of a patient's healthcare journey, at hospitals and beyond.

Smart devices that help patients control and modify chronic diseases like diabetes are being welcomed by patients. Technology is assisting them in taking control of their health and disease prevention. Rapid home testing kits, continuous glucose monitoring, doctor and nurse on call, ICU at home, dialysis and chemo at home, post-hospitalisation care, rehabilitation, and transition care have enabled a paradigm shift in providing care beyond the hospital setting walls to virtually anywhere.

Expanding access to post-hospitalization and transition care

One example of a technological application is as a support tool in the post hospitalization rehabilitation process at transition care facilities. Technology assists clinicians & HCPs in quantitatively evaluating the patient's performance and progress while providing consistent training, particularly over long periods of time. This increases therapy access while decreasing health-care costs.
In this regard, Robotics has responded to this demand with a diverse range of options. Tools for overground gait training, for example, can bridge the gap between treadmill-based and free walking. Because this technology eliminates the need for therapists to guard the patient, the patient's fear of falling is greatly reduced.

Although these robotic devices assist therapists in providing effective repetitive training and quantitative evaluation of patients' progress, any mechanism that makes rehabilitative exercises fun, challenging, and engaging must be integrated. Virtual reality (VR) and video games can fill the void in this context. That is, computer-based gamification programs that simulate real-life objects and events in an appealing environment may motivate patients to stay on track. Indeed, the use of this type of system has been shown to be an effective means for rehabilitation treatments because it allows clinicians to control and grade tasks to challenge the user while also providing them with an enriched environment to achieve high user engagement.

Exercise and staying active are critical components of chronic disease rehabilitation. In this regard, the rehabilitative ecosystem includes the Robot and Assisted Living Environment for Independent Care and Health Monitoring of the Elderly for the provision of advanced user services. Typical services for addressing the progressive decline of cognitive and motor capacity in the elderly population include exercise reminders and monitoring. Thus, following the reminder and user approval for physical activity via the robot display, the total exercise time is selected from the available options, and the robot describes each exercise acoustically and graphically while showing its camera input.

Because India has only one bed for every 1,000 people, transition care beds and out-of-hospital care is critical for recovery and rehabilitation, particularly after acute hospitalization. NCDs (noncommunicable diseases) affect more than 20% of Indians, accounting for 60% of all deaths in the country. According to the United Nations, Indians over the age of 60 will more than double by 2050, accounting for nearly 19.6 percent of the total population. All of this implies that there is an urgent need to invest in innovative solutions to these problems.

As the healthcare ecosystem evolves, maintaining the expansion of digital technology will be vital to achieve affordability. Consumers will continue to benefit as these digital gateways make healthcare more accessible and affordable. The future cost-cutting depends on continued investment in the innovation and development of digital tools that can serve as life-saving forces. These trends appear to be here to stay...and why not? When technology is used to benefit humanity, it can be a boon like no other.

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