Healthcare 2.0

From doctor interactions and diagnostics to hospice and insurance, nothing is what it used to be. For, disruptive technologies are giving India a smarter healthcare industry.

- Nalini Ramachandran

The second most-populated country in the world, India, is riding on a technology-enabled healthcare innovation wave. The government’s e-health initiatives, under the larger Digital India campaign, and disruptive technologies—discovered and practised by well-known healthcare institutions and startups—are focused on catering to the rising demand for services.

The India Brand Equity Foundation states, “The overall Indian healthcare market is worth around US$ 100 billion and is expected to grow to US$ 280 billion by 2020, a Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 22.9 per cent. Healthcare delivery, which includes hospitals, nursing homes and diagnostics centres, and pharmaceuticals, constitutes 65 per cent of the overall market. The Healthcare Information Technology (HIT) market which is valued at US$ 1 billion currently is expected to grow 1.5 times by 2020.” Although the time taken to scale up and create a sustainable monetisation model may be longer—around 300 start-ups entered the healthcare scene in 20151—healthcare is transforming steadily.

An app a day…

…promises to hold sway. Digital disruptions literally hand over healthcare into the hands of the people. The recent health app boom has made diagnoses easier, increased scope for real-time monitoring and data collection, and acted as a cost-efficient option for patients across social strata; it is a scalable business model, considering smartphone penetration throughout the country. A good example is the open-source mobile platform, CommCare (a product of Dimagi) which allows anyone to build an app on its platform. Used in fifty plus countries by organisations such as UNICEF, World Bank, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, and Public Health Foundation of India, CommCare aids healthcare field managers in monitoring patients, providing counselling, follow-up reminders, and more.