As healthcare continues its digital transformation, questions arise about what role technology such as remote patient monitoring and virtual healthcare platforms will actually play in a post-pandemic.
“In a sense, COVID has provided an opportunity for healthcare stakeholders to improve and try to focus on leveraging these innovations to better manage healthcare services,” said Jailandra Singh, Senior Equity Research Analyst at Credit Suisse. “I think digital health can be seen as a tool that can make hospitals, doctors and clinics much more efficient.”
Many digital health firms believe that the greatest opportunities to move forward will lie in collaboration, rather than competition with traditional healthcare providers.
“We had very interesting discussions before the pandemic, during which everyone told us that they liked what we were doing, but that they would be ready to move on in that direction in about two years,” said Mario Anglada, CEO of Hoy Health, the primary digital center. A care services platform designed to meet the health care needs of populations in need of health care. “When a pandemic hits, these conversations quickly change to people asking to immediately connect to our system.”
Launched in 2017, Anglada said the company’s goal was to create the first bilingual, integrated network focused on primary health care, targeting an estimated 140 million people who are estimated to be either uninsured or underinsured.
In addition to telemedicine and remote patient monitoring services, the company also offers access to medicines through a virtual pharmacy, as well as health literacy and life coaching support in 19 different languages.