Imagine a world you don’t have to worry about large healthcare bills because you get treatment at home or early diagnosis of disease. Some may argue that the cost of reaching out to patients is high and tedious. This will call for even more healthcare professionals in the future. However, the answer to this problem lies in collaborating with technology.
Healthcare for elderly patients has seen a lot of developments recently. I believe home healthcare can assume gigantic proportions to significantly bring down healthcare costs.
Before I write about more technology innovations, here are a few home needs that need to be addressed:-
- Elderly Home Care
- Behavioral Care
- Post-Surgical Or Rehab Care
- Disability Care
- New Born Care
In all these types of care scenarios, a nurse has to be equipped with meaningful information at point of care. Sensor devices play a significant role in such scenarios. While there are many sensor devices present in the market such as Phillips Home Monitoring, Dr. Morpen, EPIC, Medtronic, Zephyr, Omron, Fitbit, Contec and Remedi, clinical data validation of such results are mandatory before using the data for home-based clinical care. While majority of the sensor devices pair with handheld devices are based on the Android and iOS platforms, one still needs to carefully evaluate different supporting functions before choosing a home healthcare solution for implementation.
I argue that technology adoption should be focused around creating a continuum of care network that is available, fast, interoperable, proactive and responsive. Here are some of the essential components of such solution-
- Highly Available, High Resolution Video Conferencing
- Integrated Vital Sign Monitoring Systems
- Patient Education Portals built with Health Checkers
- Intuitive Surveys designed for measuring quality outcomes
- Automated Medication Dispensing systems integrated with pharmacy solutions
- Real-time reporting for doctors
- Automated prescriptions
- Flexible rules-based notification system
- Abiding with the functional needs of HIPAA Privacy and Security
The functional possibilities are immense and the current trend points towards significant rise of home health solutions. Various business models will evolve that will create a greater sense of connected health networks in the future.
