Why It’s Time To Digital Transformation In Healthcare?
The COVID-19 pandemic has largely sped up the digital transformation in healthcare and created some new ways in how patients can receive care on time in a secure manner. Every industry needs to adapt to the current technologies and tools to stay on the top in their sector. In the same way, the healthcare industry is constantly evolving right from telemedicine to remote patient monitoring to enhance a better patient experience.
So, today people can able to get enhanced treatment with the help of RPA, wearable devices, and more. This is possible only because of the transformation towards digital healthcare tools. This decides how we can share our health data with the professionals, and how the decision is made based on the treatment plans and health outcomes. In this article, we explain to you that how AI, blockchain, telemedicine are crucial examples for the digital transformation in healthcare.
Patient Data Management
Hospitals must capture, store and offer medical data, invoices, and reports to patients on a day-to-day basis. This requires a lot of manual work. Nevertheless, digitizing the hospital processes makes the complete workflow faster, seamless, and efficient.
Data management is a daunting task for most hospitals and digitization enables the management and staff to fast forward the processes for delivering better patient care. Creating intranets, workflows and centralized data storage will enable physicians and staff to store and retrieve data without any hardship.
Improved Communication Within The Healthcare System
Technology revolutions have enabled smoother and efficient communication between healthcare organizations. Using videos, virtual reality technology, online discussion forums, medical professionals can interact with staff or students and spread the medical knowledge for offering improved patient care and treatments.
Advanced EHR Software For Medical Records Management
Electronic health records (digital health records) have almost replaced paper records which are prone to human error. These records are highly useful to both patients and practitioners as they enable doctors to offer accurate diagnoses quickly. Emergency care providers treating critically ill patients can pull the patient data faster for providing the right treatment at that critical time.
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The Active Role Of AI & BlockChain In Healthcare
Artificial intelligence (AI) is more than just a digital transformation trend in healthcare. AI represents the epitome of medical innovation and industry players are eager to invest millions in it. The healthcare AI-powered tools market is expected to exceed $34 billion by 2025, which means this technology will shape almost all facets of the industry.
Chatbots and virtual health assistants are other AI-based technology that patients are becoming familiar with. Chatbots can fill a multitude of roles from customer service representatives to diagnostic tools and even therapists. Their versatility is being translated into heavy investments. The global healthcare chatbots market is projected to reach $314.3 million by 2023 from $122 million in 2018. But the real power of AI can be best observed in areas like precision medicine, medical imaging, drug discovery, and genomics.
In the same way, blockchain is trending today more than ever towards the digital transformation in healthcare. Blockchain is often seen as a puzzling concept however, the better people understand it, the more it will continue to advance the healthcare industry.
Blockchain is a digital ledger or a computerized database of transactions. Shared across a network of computers, it allows customers to safely exchange financial information with suppliers, without the need of a third party such as a bank. The healthcare and pharmaceutical industries are already heavily investing in blockchain as it is already proven to be effective in preventing data breaches and also improving the accuracy of medical records.
The Growth Of Wearable Medical Devices
Another trend of the digital transformation in healthcare is companies collecting their health data from medical devices, including wearable technology. In the past, most patients were satisfied with undergoing a physical once a year and only checking in with their doctors when something went wrong. But in the digital age, patients are focusing on prevention and maintenance and demanding information about their health more frequently.
As a result, healthcare companies are being proactive by investing in wearable technology devices that can provide up-to-date monitoring of high-risk patients to determine the likelihood of a major health event.
The Importance Of Big Data In Healthcare
Big data aggregates information about a business through formats such as social media, e-commerce, online transactions, and financial transactions, and identifies patterns and trends for future use. For the healthcare industry, big data can provide several important benefits, including:
Lower rate of medication errors – through patient record analysis, the software can flag any inconsistencies between a patient’s health and drug prescriptions, alerting health professionals and patients when there is a potential risk of a medication error.
Facilitating Preventive Care – a high volume of people stepping into emergency rooms are recurring patients also called “frequent flyers.” They can account for up to 28% of visits. Big data analysis could identify these people and create preventive plans to keep them from returning.
More Accurate Staffing – big data’s predictive analysis could help hospitals and clinics estimate future admission rates, which helps these facilities allocate the proper staff to deal with patients. This saves money and reduces emergency room wait times when a facility is understaffed.
Final Thoughts
The healthcare system is undergoing a drastic shift towards how health information is obtained and handled securely. With the help of online patient portal software that provides medical history and test results, patients are now actively participating in their care. Ensuring this kind of digital transformation in healthcare.
Today, most healthcare organizations are stepping up their digital systems to overcome the current healthcare challenges and to have good control over the costs.
Ready to transform your practice with the new digital healthcare solutions? Contact Vozo today
About the author
With more than 4 years of experience in the dynamic healthcare technology landscape, Sid specializes in crafting compelling content on topics including EHR/EMR, patient portals, healthcare automation, remote patient monitoring, and health information exchange. His expertise lies in translating cutting-edge innovations and intricate topics into engaging narratives that resonate with diverse audiences.