Mumbai: Evidence-backed digital content AIDS healthcare professionals and gives patients access to crucial health information in a convenient way. It enables better outcomes for patients with greater engagement and cost-effectively increases access to health information. According to a report by Precedence Research, the size of the global digital health market was estimated at $332.53 billion in 2022 and is projected to reach around $1,694.21 billion by 2032, with a growth of 19.4%. CAGR over the forecast period of 2023 to 2032.
ETHealthworld, in association with Wolters Kluwer, brought together leading industry experts to deliberate on “Understanding Technology Healthcare professionals (healthcare professionals) and improve digital skills: The next growth horizon.’ From enabling product promotional content, avoiding content that leads to digital fatigue, to effectively capitalizing on the latest trends shaping the healthcare professionals engagement framework, the panel discussed issues of enormous importance to health professionals.
The discussion was attended by Cathy WolfeWolters Kluwer, executive vice president and president and Ruchi Tushir, vice president and general manager, Global Growth Markets; Dr. Kamlesh Patil, Director of Health and Medical Technology, Lupin; Priyadarshan Soni, Director of Marketing, Macleods Pharmaceuticals; Vinita Gaur, Director of Marketing, Merck Group; Anuja Agarwal, Marketing Director, Sanofi, Lavkesh Bhatia, Individual Consultant, and Rushabh Gandhi, Marketing Director, Cipla Oncology, CIPLA. The session was moderated by Prabhat Prakash, ETHealthworld’s Senior Digital Content Creator.
Improve patient outcomes with evidence-backed digital content
The conversation opened with Ruchi Tushir sharing the results of ongoing market research with a leading consulting firm. The research focused on the continuing education of HCPs and the desire to obtain relevant information, keeping them up to date on the latest developments in the medical world. The study also revealed that UpToDate Clinical decision support system (CDSS) is the best-known and most widely used evidence-based CDSS tool designed to help healthcare providers make informed decisions about patient care. Tushir stressed the importance of educating users about the features of evolving tools and how they can be leveraged to their advantage. This is crucial to reduce error rates and improve diagnostics, which leads to better results. Cathy Wolfe spoke about the role evidence-backed content plays in the internet age. According to Wolfe, digital is the enabler, but a lot depends on the quality of the content. For that, it is necessary to ensure that the evidence is complete and up-to-date. Citing an example of oncology, which is frequently evolving and finding new paths in its field of improvement. He added: “It’s all about that evidence-based content that stays with quality.”
Role of digital assets and tools for India’s skewed doctor-patient ratio
Tushir touched on the skewed doctor-patient relationship in India and how, in addition to adding more doctors to the system, the need of the hour is to create an ecosystem that enables participation at multiple levels to make it more relevant and efficient.
To improve efficiency and relevance, clinicians require access to high-quality information that can be obtained quickly and easily. Consequently, they rely on CDSS and relevant journal articles to assist in their diagnostic and treatment processes.
HCPs need ongoing education and reliable sources of information
Gaur shared that the trends are drastically changing and now 70 percent of HCPs are dependent on digital content. Digging deeper, Gaur shed light on the increased use of digital content among healthcare professionals. She commented: “It only took COVID for the pharmaceutical industry to realize that doctors are also digitally savvy. Digital transformation has automated processes to start within the pharmaceutical industry.” She added that the impact of digitization remains to be seen.
Soni touched on the changing times and how data analysis is the driving force because now only data is readily available. He added: “It’s not about data, it’s about analytics and how to present it. So now it’s more about analytics than data.”
Speaking about HCP’s commitment and its evolution over the years, Dr. Patel said, “We’re in a nascent phase, we’re experimenting, if you will, we’re doing digital rather than being digital.”
Impact of digitization on health professionals and the pharmaceutical industry
Commenting on multiple data inputs and verification along with utilization as a big challenge, Agarwal said, “Data is a big challenge for us, and the biggest challenge is aggregating it. So, we have disjointed sources of data coming in.”
Agarwal said the biggest change is bringing the data together and then creating a cohesive understanding of how to influence the customer.
Underlining that the adoption of multi-channel engagement by pharmaceutical companies depends on identifying the key gap area they are trying to address, Gandhi said: “In different segments of physicians, different challenges may arise. There have been many failures, when COVID happened all the companies tried to implement electronic health record and electronic medical record models, but sustainability has been an issue and few doctors have adopted it”.
He went on to say that there is a gap in India about patients reaching the right place at the right time. He corroborated this by saying that the incidence of cancer in the country is around Rs 10 lakhs but not all cases are identified and treated at the right time.
Speaking about the challenges facing pharmaceutical marketers due to digital disruption, Bhatia said: “Most organizations are dealing with this in the sense that there is a perception between what can be implemented and how much will be adopted. As far as the challenges, it’s more about what’s internal or external, and somewhere about the overlap between culture, legal and compliance.” He added that more and more companies are reserving more of their spending for regional initiatives.
The experts concluded the discussion on a positive note, saying that digital health services have enormous potential and will expand soon. They called it a great opportunity for the healthcare and life sciences industry to expand its presence beyond conventional areas while exploring new avenues for growth.
(Brand Connection Initiative)
