Like other branches of technology, healthcare is rapidly changing. Many new healthcare trends are finding their way into medicinal purposes, helping people in new and exciting ways. Let us take a closer look at some of these new health technologies.
Telemedicine
Telemedicine has slowly become a popular alternative to regular doctor visits for the people who are underinsured. Its full potential will be achieved once a new set of laws are passed. This will allow doctors to be paid equally for offering virtual consultations, as they would be in regular appointments.
Telemedicine is a form of remote diagnosing and treatment of patients through digital technologies. Doctors are already communicating with their patients through phones, emails, and webcam. They also communicate among themselves to achieve better collaboration and make better decisions. Something advanced like this would be unthinkable a couple of decades ago.
Big Data
This is something that changed the way people analyze information in any industry. Analytics in the healthcare industry can help patients to significantly reduce their costs of treatment, avoid some preventable diseases, and improve their overall life quality. The advanced data mining techniques, which changed other industries, could efficiently work in healthcare to better analyze conditions and the necessary care for the patients.
Personalized ‘medical maps’ for each patient are a great potential here. By using simple information as anatomy and physiology, and those more complex like DNA, RNA, and chemical compositions, the quality of every step of the way could be increased. This was not possible in the past and could prove vital in diagnosing and treating patients in the future.
Medical Mobile Applications
Today, mobile apps have completely redefined our lives, as they are used for practically everything. These apps are the perfect example of the ease technology brings to healthcare.
Applications allow the patients to search for services fast and easy. For example, with ZocDoc, they can search for doctors, but also to monitor their diabetes conditions using Diabetes in Check. These apps also make life significantly easier for doctors.
Around 80% of physicians use mobile devices at work. Applications like UpToDate help them access the latest medical information on a wide range of conditions. Some apps also provide personalized care plans and aid doctors in making better decisions with patients.
Artificial Intelligence
Artificial intelligence in healthcare is redefining the industry by improving the quality of care, outcomes of patients and decreasing the costs for insurance, hospitals, and payers. AI swiftly expands its reach across the healthcare industry. The technology can accelerate multiple processes and reduce costs.
There are reports that Microsoft works on developing a machine called the ‘Hanover,’ which will be able to memorize relevant medical papers to predict optimal drug combinations for cancer patients. This would be revolutionary in every way.
Cloud Technology
Cloud services allow organizations to be integrated and interconnected while storing information safely and securely. Healthcare industry requires the management of large amounts of data from numerous sources, like patient records and social and medical information.
Earlier, in order to keep information together, healthcare organizations had to pay to maintain expensive systems. With clouds, however, they do not have to worry about maintenance, and only pay for what they need. Storing information in the cloud makes it more secure because it is not stored in one place, and it can be scaled easily. Healthcare organizations tend to spend too much on maintaining stores of information. This problem could easily be solved by moving to a cloud platform.
Summary
It is truly good news that the healthcare industry is embracing exciting modern healthcare trends. It is clear that the ones who fail to keep track with all of the modern technology will, unfortunately, be left behind. In a high-cost industry like this, it is of vital importance for healthcare companies to be aware of and implement these new technologies into their business.