Connected health: Future of the health system

The recently published Future Health Index study aims to analyze the future of healthcare concerning citizens' access to technology, innovation, healthcare integration or connectivity of healthcare services.

This global study has been organized by Philips in conjunction with the MIT Technology Review. 25 national health experts have collaborated in it. In total, 33,000 doctors, nurses, nutritionists, and other health professionals have been interviewed. We must add different insurance companies and members of society from 19 countries and 5 continents. The trend towards an older population in which there will be more and more chronic patients has ignited the interest of the international community to find out how to deal with this situation.As for the confidence of the health system, in Spain, experts took gold with 71%, followed closely by France, Singapore, Canada, and Sweden. At the other extreme is China, with a greater difference between perception and confidence in its health system and its quality.

If we talk about “connected health”, what could be considered the most positive aspect? Most of the health professionals interviewed have opted for home care.

Undoubtedly, in-hospital access to medical records is one of the most important factors in healthcare connectivity. Of the patients who have suffered respiratory, cardiac, gynecological or cancer disorders, have had fertility problems, or have been or are pregnant, 32% state that the last time they went to a health service, professionals in this field shared their medical history.

According to the conclusions drawn from the study, the improvement of connectivity and of the technology applied to healthcare will mean an advance in the quality of all healthcare systems, in addition to mitigating the effects of the aging population.

Connected Health facilitates access to medical care anytime, anywhere 

There are thousand of people who monitor their health without having to go to the hospital through a Connected Health Program to remotely monitor the health of people that combines the Internet of Things, Big Data and Artificial Intelligence. This program allows healthcare professionals to offer patients predictive medicine to anticipate any possible complications in their state of health.

Digitization allows the patient to take part and be in control of their health. But this role is not real if the patient cannot access the service when and where he wants, whether at home, at work, on the street. This paradigm shift, from reactive medicine to predictive medicine has proved beneficial for a lot of people suffering from illness. 

In this sense, hospitals are already testing different devices, such as a 

• connected smart mirror that helps maintain a healthy diet or sleep hygiene; systems for rehabilitation of injuries in the home salon; 
• SmartTV that allow video-visit an admitted relative or accompany the parents by video-consultation to three when they cannot move, or even a battery of wearables to do health self-checks at home.

None of this makes sense without the judgment of a doctor on the other side. 

And this is the key to Connected Health which facilitate the connection between the patient who has a problem and the doctor who can provide a solution. If the physical presence of a patient in front of the doctor is not strictly necessary, why do we force people to go to the hospital? 

Connected Health facilitates the patient to have access to medical care wherever they are through different wearables ( internet of things ) that measure bio-metric indicators in people. A

“Medicine and health have never been so close to people before, in their daily lives. The 24/7 monitoring allows us to meet the fundamental requirement of predictive medicine: that effectively predicts the possibility of a complication–A heat stroke, a decompensation, an arrhythmia - to be able to put the means and avoid it.

Connected Health has set itself the goal of exceeding 1,000 monitored patients and extending its benefits to the home. We have the technology to break the barriers of the hospital and allow people to access excellent medicine without having to go to the doctor's office.