Healthcare technology innovation is rightly seen as the answer to many of the challenges facing global health systems. The role of digital technology in realising the dream of accessible, affordable, and sustainable care has grown across the entire range of health economies. It serves current needs and builds a basis for future healthcare: personalised, digital by default and truly patient-centric.
The UK Government continues investing in growing capabilities in areas such as AI and, more broadly, data-driven healthcare. It has further fuelled the creation of cutting edge, evidence-based solutions. Solutions which have the key to effectively unlock global challenges.
Why digitalisation is a key enabler
The demand for healthcare services is also growing more generally. Patients have ever-increasing expectations about the safety and quality of NHS services. In addition, regulations are becoming more complex, and hospital managers must adhere to stricter regulatory governance. NHS and private hospitals must excel in providing healthcare services, and digitalisation is key to enabling this. The concept revolutionises hospitals on a human, financial and operational level leading to the evolution of smart hospitals.
Smart hospitals are holistic, interdisciplinary innovators. Although smart hospitals require advanced IT technologies, becoming a smart hospital is not merely an IT project. Rather, it is a deeply embedded, system-wide process requiring the participation of all staff, including physicians, nurses, and management.
The benefits are enormous. Smart hospitals offer lower infection risks and enhanced security. They also improve patient satisfaction and optimise staff and energy efficiency. Smart infrastructure can help hospitals master digital transformation by collecting, analysing, and using patient data well.
According to McKinsey, countries implementing digital technologies in healthcare delivery could help realise cost savings of more than ten percent of overall annual national healthcare expenditures. As a result, investors have recognised the opportunity. US-based digital health start-ups brought in almost $30 billion in 2021. That was almost double the total investment of the year prior. Moreover, Start-up Health reported that health innovation funding reached $44 billion globally in 2021. That is a 20-fold increase from a decade ago.
The benefits of digital health
Aside from the cost savings outlined above, digital health means collecting and analysing data to predict disease and intervene quicker. It means physicians can have access to patient notes when they need them to make better decisions. It also means patients can be seen by medical professionals without travelling long distances.
Another benefit is allowing citizens to educate themselves on their health and wellness. Patients can also use machines to do basic tasks. This frees up skilled staff to do more caring. Put simply, the healthcare system can do far more with less.
In 2021, the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) announced a draft strategy titled Data Saves Lives: Reshaping health and social care with data. One key aspect of this strategy is the development of smart hospitals, which will use digital interoperability to redesign traditional hospital processes, systems, and infrastructures.
At a time when the NHS is trying to recover from a treatment backlog created by the Covid-19 pandemic, these smart systems can significantly improve capacity issues and reduce staff burnout by creating intelligently optimised patient healthcare journeys.
One of the critical aspects of smart hospitals is the opportunity to bring data together from across the country. It is gathered and shared through one central hub. Developing a single interoperability platform that connects all hospital systems can transform how they are managed. From handling medicines to admitting patients, it makes day-to-day processes smoother and more efficient for both patients and healthcare professionals.
Outside hospital walls, these platforms can also improve the lives of patients with long term conditions. They can easily integrate at-home wearables and other devices with hospital systems for seamless remote monitoring.
Smart integration
Ensuring that different health tech systems can communicate with each other is vital. By creating systems that can share the huge quantities of data that is available between departments, deeper insights can be discovered and more importantly, patient healthcare outcomes can be improved.
These systems must be integrated. If not, hospitals end up with just more siloed pools of separate data and more disjointed services within organisations. It is an issue that has plagued NHS health tech from previous generations. Likewise, accessing and integrating with legacy systems to extract all important data is also critical.
A patient-centric approach to healthcare services
Since its inception, Netcompany has focussed on healthcare for its evident criticality to society. In fact, since 2015, Netcompany has been responsible for the development and maintenance of the e-health portal Sundhed.dk. It is the official portal for public Danish healthcare services.
The portal enables citizens and healthcare professionals to find information and communicate with one another. It facilitates a more patient-centric approach to Danish healthcare services. It also provides one-stop information access for professionals and citizens on a wide range of social healthcare services and gives seamless access to and sharing of personal health data. Additionally, Netcompany has been at the forefront of developing Covid solutions such as the Covid pass for the UK, Scotland, Denmark, and Norway
The UK Government has committed to build 48 new hospitals by 2030. This new hospital programme will have transformational effects on the fundamentals of health and social care infrastructure. It will also give staff and patients access to exciting innovative technology that will benefit them daily. Now is the time to strive for the art of the possible and drive transformation with the new advancements in healthcare technology and the evolution of smart hospitals.
Netcompany is an international IT services company based in Denmark with 10 offices in 6 countries and 6000+ employees. Netcompany delivers society- and business-critical IT projects that accelerate clients’ digital transformation at the highest quality, on time and on budget. For more information please visit: www.netcompany.com
