Digital Health

Most of us might be familiar with this upcoming branch of medicine called 'Digital Health,for that past few years.Post Covid scenario,it became our hope and understanding that 'Digital Health can help in reducing healthcare access inequalities and helps in streamlining the healthcare system in our country.Digital revolution in India helped in streamlining many other branches like internal security,policing,auditing and etc.
Let's dissect its role in Healthcare field.

1.PROLOGUE
 Definition
   'Digital health, or digital healthcare, is a broad, multidisciplinary concept that includes concepts from an intersection between technology and healthcare. Digital health applies digital transformation to the healthcare field, incorporating software, hardware and services. Under its umbrella, digital health includes mobile health (mHealth) apps, electronic health records (EHRs), electronic medical records (EMRs), wearable devices, telehealth and telemedicine, as well as Personalised medicine.'
   https://www.techtarget.com/searchhealthit/definition/digital-health-digital-healthcare
   
Components of Digital Health
Currently the following interdisciplinary components fall under this umbrella term called 'Digital Health'
1.Remote sensored wearable
2.Telemedicine and Health Informatics
3.Data analytics,AI and predictive modelling
4.Bioinformatics tools(aka OMICS)
5.Health awareness through social media
6.Digitized Health record platforms
7.Decision Support Systems
and many others

Why is Digital Health gaining momentum?
Especially after Digital Revolution in India,and post covid,it has gained a lot of momentum and most of us look at it as the answer for many issues which were already in our society like
1.Increased access to Health
2.Reducing cost of Healthcare
3.Personalised case
4.Decreasing inefficiencies
5.Possibly improve quality of care.

2.ISSUES
 I would like to elaborate these issues by defining all the stakeholders in Digital Health.We have patients,healthcare workers(doctors and nurses),investors and regulatory bodies.
 INDUSTRY/investors/companies/service providers are the one who invest money in this and they naturally expect maximum profit with minimum risk.
 MARKET is the patients or customers who use this product.
 The atmosphere or environment is in a way that it is difficult to determine which tools are supported and which are not,mostly due to poor regulations,reimbursement or simply due to the fact that it is a new growing field.Most of the products which are released by the Industry are not clinically validated(Ex:Apple Heart Study).This is a perfect example of Digital Health benefiting the 'industry' more than the 'market'.
Since it is a new field,there isn't even enough research to show us which patient/stakeholder/customer adopt to which way.I would also like to mention few other issues such as 'confidentiality','security','data privacy issues' and 'lack of information/evidence for doctors to prescribe or use any technology/product'.

Way forward
1.Translational research,i.e,shifting the product to patient bedside and checking out for its efficacy on the patient.
2.Improved awareness regarding this budding field for medical students by aiding them in knowledge and Skills in domains like social media,EMR,telemedicine,interoperability,data analytics etc.
3.Shifting the source of data from already available sources to mining data from case to case and using this 'Case Based reasoning' as the inputs for Data analytics.
  'Medical Informatics should complement the traditional quest for general biomedical knowledge with the advance of acquisition, storage, communication and use of individual knowledge. By doing so, Medical Informatics will provide a solution to the problems that arise during the use of general knowledge and, in the same time, will enable clinical research as well as advanced decision support and education of both healthcare providers and patients.'
  https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC544898/

I would like to conclude this blog by 'framing a problem statement' we have infront of us regarding 'Digital Health'

  'Overpushing an untested product or service in this poorly regulated environment may lead to loss of valuable trust on doctors and places more trust on medical websites and industry'
 'Trust between the patient and healthcare team is at the heart of Health and Wellness'.


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