What's IoT doing in Health?
IoT has certainly brought a revolution in the health care industry and has empowered people to live healthier lives by using connected devices such as wearables and hand-held devices. IoT has enabled consumers to take control of their own health in a highly personalized manner.
The healthcare industry is one of the fastest industries to adopt Internet of Things. Integrating IoT into medical devices greatly improves the quality and effectiveness of service and brings high value for the elderly, patients with chronic conditions, and those who require constant supervision.
The utilization of IoT in the healthcare industry is increasing rapidly. Organizations and enterprises are redesigning their business models to provide health care solutions that fulfill the growing demands of data-fuelled customers.
Let’s take a look at some health care devices developed using IoT:
- Wearable or portable devices can be connected to the cloud to extract and analyze collected patient data in real time.
- Patients can be monitored at their homes using live video and audio streaming.
- Doctors are able to monitor vital health indicators that are collected by smart devices.
- Health care providers are able to create diagrams and other visualizations based on data collected from health monitoring devices.
Healthcare organizations and care recipients can benefit from IoT in following ways:
1. Decreased Costs
Using sensor enabled smart solutions, monitoring patients can be done on a real-time basis. Thus, it significantly cuts down on unnecessary visits to doctors. Also, advanced home care facilities using IoT will cut down on hospital stays and readmissions.
2. Improved Outcomes of Treatment
Connectivity of health care solutions through virtual or cloud platforms enables the health provider to access real-time information. On the basis of this data, they can make informed decisions as well as offer treatment that is evidence based.
3. Improved Disease Management
Using sensor enabled solutions to monitor patients on a continuous basis, health care providers can get access to real-time data, and using this timely information, diseases can be treated before they get out of hand.
4. Reduced Errors
IoT facilitates accurate collection of data and automated workflows combined with data-driven decisions. These factors are an excellent way of cutting down system costs and minimizing errors.
5. Enhanced Patient Experience
Using the Internet of Things, hospitals and the healthcare industry can put emphasis on the needs of the patient and gain their trust. This includes proactive treatments, accurate diagnosis, timely intervention by physicians and enhanced treatment outcomes.
The Internet of Things is undoubtedly transforming the healthcare industry completely by redefining how apps, devices, healthcare solutions and people interact and connect with each other. IoT is constantly offering new tools and efficiencies that makes up an integrated healthcare system and ensures reduced healthcare cost, better care for patients and improved outcomes. As the Internet of Things is becoming increasingly relevant to the health industry, it has given rise to several challenges. Healthcare experts and technology analysts are concerned with data security. IoT deals with sensitive health information being transmitted over the internet; this makes IoT devices more vulnerable to hacks than offline records.
Regardless of these concerns, IoT offers a huge saving potential for both healthcare providers and recipients. As more funding and research is devoted to the healthcare IoT market segment, IoT will become more secure and an integral part of personal health.
Joseph Did You Know, Singer & Songwriter
7 年I'm interested to see which areas take this on faster than others learning from the growth. I'm leaning more towards diabetics and those with allergies providing a monitor and are able to associate their intake with their body's natural response. If we can successfully manage the data, the idea is we can share the information and allow others to follow tweaking the platform to help with their specific needs like heart monitoring, sleeping patterns and so much more.
Co-Founder at MADEFIT, Teacher and Physical Education Specialist for Elementary Schools
7 年Self-care is going to be the new health care, as cliché as that may sound, especially in the expensive health care sector of the U.S., and the unfortunate, continued (lack of) funding of the National Health Service (NHS) in the UK. The Internet of (Medical) Things is one vital way to reduce the burden on the health care system. Perhaps what is more important is that the IoT, particularly innovative wearable technologies, is one patient-centric approach where meaningful change can actually occur, rather than technology simply informing. There’s only one health wearable device (different – and superior - league to fitness trackers) that is currently on the market that is ticking all the right boxes. An example of the benefits of this technology is that this device will be able to estimate Blood Glucose levels by Q4 2017. It was confirmed in a public statement several weeks ago, and if this is as accurate as its other features, it will be the world’s first wearable, non invasive, continuous wristband that will revolutionize the Diabetes field. The most important aspect with the IoT is for technology not to flood us with information where we are slaves to the system, ever feeding data to it and simply being informed, but rather, for technology to empower the individual’s health, which in turn, translates to wellness and an improved lifestyle where meaningful change can occur because of the technology. A good article.
Global Business Leader - Life Sciences. Passionate about using digital advancements to improve healthcare outcomes and enhance healthcare delivery.
7 年Very interesting. Soon IoT will reach also primary care settings and we will see the same benefits, but with even a bigger impact.
Medical Device/Pharma Commercialization Business Manager
7 年It seems that once again, Bill Gates' "Business at the Speed of Thought" is repeating itself. He recognized that automation of rote tasks by computer technology elevated the role of the user to make better decisions which increased the user's value in the info. supply chain. With IoT and associated collection infrastructure quickly becoming a commodity, the challenge is to provide meaningful information and tools such that the end-user can add value. Trending of large vital sign data sets from the home as a replacement for the general ward in the hospital only addresses the "signs" aspect of signs and symptoms used to guide care. The market need is now how to figure out how we operationalize health such that it is no longer an art. The first step towards affecting this paradigm shift is effective event based monitoring that alerts the remote provider when to act, but still employ signs and symptoms to determine an appropriate intervention. The technology is clearly not the problem any longer but the type of data that needs to be collected and defining the correct questions that need to be answered in order to be valuable.
Investing in the future of Granville, NY
7 年I think this is a timely topic to be debating in the industry. A couple of thoughts. Someday, IoT could be an integrator but it first needs to be a huge disruptor of the status quo. Also, "monitoring" implies that someone is watching. We certainly need to monitor the 50% of the population (those with chronic disease) who generate 91% of all healthcare costs; however, that's not happening with my 93-year old father suffering with Parkinson's associated dementia. There isn't a single provider in the "system" who is keeping him home and comfortable. We "monitor" him with our own tiny team, no one else. If you want to make an impact, help us...help through the retail market. In my experience, innovators want to go to big hospitals to sell disruptive products because the sales can be big. Trouble is, providers whose main focus is fixing us when we break simply can't simultaneously work to disrupt that process and, therefore, aren't going to be that interested in self-disrupting. I hope you innovators will continue to focus on creating products that help all of us who are simply trying to live as safely and happily as possible, regardless of our circumstances.