Dr. Rajendra Pratap Gupta, Co-Chair, Global digital health Summit, Founder, health parliament spoke with ETHealthworld’s Prathiba Raju about how every doctor should prepare to embrace digital health in the next two years.
What is the future of digital health adoption in India?
India is the fastest growing digital health market in the world. Indian government targets Rs 100 crore Ayushman Bharat Health Accounts (ABHA) in 2023, and this sends a clear message to all clinicians and healthcare organizations about the way forward; those who do not see the future will face a tough challenge. I am sure that ABHA account will eventually become India’s default electronic health record. Every organization and every clinician must prepare to embrace digital health in the next two years. India is the only country where politics has moved faster than technology, and the government has played a key role in it.
What are the critical issues for mass adoption of digital health in India?
Small Health Care Organizations (SHCOs) provide 80 percent of health care in the country and beyond metropolitan areas, they are the key health care providers. SHCOs should be supported with digital adoption. The Health Parliament expert group held a workshop that highlighted this issue. Government and industry must come together to support them, or we are headed for a huge digital divide in health care, and the cost of care for the middle class will rise dramatically, and people in smaller cities will have no choice. . but to travel to the subways to seek treatment.
The doctors are still in await-and-watch mode, and those who fail to adopt the technology will make way for those who are adopting it. Every doctor in India must move to adopt digital tools in their practice. While it’s easy to dismiss the role of AI in clinical practice, in my opinion, by 2028, the technology will handle at least 50 percent of the tasks that doctors perform today.
Can you tell us how the 2023 edition of the Global Digital Health Summit differs from previous ones? How will you help drive the digital health ecosystem?
Last year, the summit focused on ROI in digital health, issues with adoption, and scale, and this year, we’re focusing on solutions that will help manage chronic patients in the digital age—solutions that clinicians and hospitals can use, how the pharmaceutical industry can take advantage of digital therapy, and how AI and robotics will transform healthcare delivery. We have found that doctors and small hospitals find it difficult to choose the right technologies given the saturated market of solution providers. We are launching two platforms to solve these problems a) SMART Clinicians’ Suite and b) SMART Hospital Suite. These platforms will make it easier for doctors and hospitals to choose from proven technologies available on the market. We will also work with solution providers to offer the best deals for doctors and hospitals.
We will also publish a main study on Generative AI (GPT Chat), Web Search and CDS. This will help clinicians understand with data, the excitement and competition of generative AI and how they might use it, and if it’s worth using. Since the study is ongoing, it’s too soon to share more at this time. We are focusing on key medical specialties and how they will be transformed through digital transformation.
Can you tell us about APAC? dtx Leadership alliance?
In my opinion, “the pharmaceutical industry has to go beyond pills, hospitals have to go beyond beds, and doctors have to go beyond the stethoscope, so conventional ways of delivering care are over.” .
Physicians and the pharmaceutical industry should consider the use of digital therapies. Our research revealed that clinicians and industry lack the correct knowledge about the DTx opportunity and the way forward to take advantage of DTx (Digital Therapeutics) and therefore we are launching the Asia Pacific Digital Therapeutics Alliance to raise awareness. and help DTx adoption in the Asia Pacific region, as our needs are unique and market conditions are different than in the west.
