How IoT Based Mobile Applications are Changing the World of Health Care Industry?

Suddenly, there seems to be a gamut of smart devices everywhere. From smart televisions to smartphones to smart cameras and even smart clothes and smart shoes.

How are all these gadgets ‘smart and connected’?

These gadgets can track, collect and share user data through sensors and connected applications, enabling customers or smart algorithms to make decisions as per this collected data. These smart devices together form the IoT in that particular space.

IoT is the internet of things wherein, billions of physical devices around the world are now connected to the internet and through the internet, to each other, all collecting and sharing data. Technology evolutions like artificial intelligence, big data, and machine learning, amongst others have further fueled the accuracy and efficiency with which these gadgets tend to work and make human lives easy. With their varied utilities and functionalities, these IoT devices have now become an intrinsic part of almost all industries and Healthcare is no different!

IoT in Healthcare: The pandemic situation

Though healthcare has always been one of the most important aspects of human lives; the Covid-19 pandemic of 2019, has made its prominence ‘centerstage’.

With one of the highest casualty and fatality rates ever, country-wide lockdowns and failing Governments; the pandemic has clearly shown the world how important health is and the havoc it can play when not handled well. Technology in the meanwhile has enhanced its value in terms of the autonomous services that IoT has been providing in terms of communications, remote patient monitoring and care, record upkeep, patient data upkeep, etc.

Benefits of IoT in Healthcare

The global IoT in Healthcare Market is forecasted to grow at a rate of 19.8% from USD 60.83 Billion in 2019 to USD 260.75 Billion in 2027. These numbers indicate that there are several benefits that this technology has brought to the healthcare world and have been innovating in various directions to ensure these are well utilized for the larger good. Let us analyze, what exactly makes them a formidable pair:

1. Affordability

The pandemic has taught us that there are various aspects of healthcare routines, gadgets, etc. that need to be checked regularly for efficient service delivery. For instance: hospitals require staff to continuously answer patient calls to book appointments and resolve queries. Similarly, experts are required to ensure all healthcare machines like CT scan machines, etc. stay in order. All these staffs tend to charge a prominent figure in salaries. IoT has provided several solutions for these kinds of tasks like chatbots, maintenance sensors, etc. that take care of all this and are comparatively way too affordable than human staff.

2. Accuracy in Treatment

IoT helps track and record user data, in this case, the health metrics from various wearables and other gadgets in hospitals, etc., and analyzes patterns’ to help doctors make more accurate and efficient decisions. For instance, IoT has been playing a major role in hospitals to monitor vitals of covid-19 patients and have been helping doctors to not only record their symptoms; but sharing them with national records to help keep an overall check on pandemic casualties, tests, and fatalities.

3. Timely Treatment

As IoT-enabled devices help users record their daily activities and vitals, it helps physicians as well as individuals themselves monitor their health conditions daily and reach for help, whenever the need arises. As the latest, Warrior Watch Study found that subtle changes in a participant's heart rate variability (HRV) measured by an Apple Watch were able to signal the onset of COVID-19 up to seven days before the individual was diagnosed with the infection via nasal swab. This data was also able to identify those who have symptoms. This Is how technology has been responding to this health-related world crisis.

4. Drugs and Equipment Management

Technology is best at creating, updating, and managing records. The same can be said in terms of hospital medicines and drugs.

IoT applications have been helping hospital management staff to easily manage their inventories, without the requirement of much staff.

5. Remote treatment for safety

Since the pandemic situation, several patients (both low-risk as well as high-risk) have been avoiding going to hospitals as they are high-risk covid contracting zones. IoT devices have been helping patients to connect with doctors and hospitals remotely, to get treatment in a safer environment. Apart from health perspective, IoT is also being used in the best safety apps for women to ensure utmost safety of women in this era.

Research

IoT-led devices help track user data and analyze this data to form comprehensible patterns. These patterns help health researchers to understand various diseases, their symptoms, and growth cycles, leading to faster and more efficient work processes of vaccine and treatment developments.

These are the major aspects of healthcare that IoT is now a part of.

How has IoT been helping the Healthcare industry?

IoT has been instrumental in developing several applications and gadgets wherein the human body’s vitals and other body processes are tracked and measured accurately and in real-time; in a manner that is easily understandable for doctors and helps them take timely actions. For instance: an innovation in this direction, HealthPatch is a small band-aid-like patch pasted on the chest of the patient. With the help of IoT, modern best heartbeat apps are capable of measuing heart rates, respiration, temperature, steps are taken, sleep cycle, stress levels, and whether the user has fallen or otherwise become incapacitated. Let us analyze and understand more such examples:

Robotic Surgeries

Robots have been now aiding surgeons and hospitals for years to overcome the limitations of pre-existing minimally-invasive surgical procedures and to enhance the capabilities of surgeons performing open surgery; by reducing the chances of error and increasing overall efficiency. The technology also helps surgeons perform remote surgeries in emergencies when they might not be available close to the patient or might even be maneuvering several surgeries simultaneously. Robotic surgeries have already created several benchmarks in terms of heart surgeries, gastrointestinal surgeries, bone surgeries, gynecology, spine surgeries, etc.

Smart Hearing devices

There are several smart hearing devices like EVOKE out there, that enable individuals with hearing issues to listen to exactly how and where they would like to listen. With features like noise-canceling, volume controllers, and a machine learning and artificial intelligence-based algorithm; these hearing aids are getting smarter by the day.

Online Consultations

There are various smart apps like medibuddy, practo, etc. that are currently helping physicians provide consultation through video calls. These smart apps through their customized dashboards also help doctors keep records of their patient charts and easily coordinate with them for timely appointments anywhere, anytime. It also helps doctors keep their patients safely away from highly-crowded hospital lounges and waiting areas. Smartphones and smart wearables have been playing a prominent role in these IoT applications.

IoT in Health Insurance

IoT devices collect user data and this data is the biggest boon for insurance companies that need to contact intended buyers to sell their policies. These companies utilize this data to undertake data-driven decisions in all operational processes for successful process outcomes. These companies leverage data for their underwriting and claims operations. It also helps them to detect fraud claims and bring transparency between insurers and customers.

Chatbots

Chatbots, with their highly complex and engaging algorithms; today form an important part of the customer support team of hospitals, clinics, insurance companies, etc. Their effectiveness in providing the user a respectable answer and resolving issues instantly have made it a hit amongst these organizations. In The current covid times, wherein most of the people were unable to reach offices; chatbots provided medicare help to customers, as and when they required.

Ingestible smart medicines

Ingestible sensors form the next generation of medication. These are pill-sized sensors that monitor the traveling of medications and their overall affectivity on the underlying issues within the human body and warns us if it detects any irregularities. These sensors can be a boon for diabetic patients as well as heart and gastroenteritis patients as they would help in curbing symptoms and provide an early warning for diseases.

Development of ‘Smart hospitals’

Hospitals are spaces where human lives are saved and made. Human lives may also get endangered here. Thus, they need to be in a spic and span shall, at all times. Any faulty machine or one with a ‘passed service date’ or a broken part may end up giving a faulty report or even may stop working completely, leading to greater reporting time and thus, greater time to receive treatment. This could be inadvertently dangerous. Smart hospitals these days have installed sensors that tend to remind hospital staff about machine’s due service dates as well as guide them beforehand about situations, wherein these healthcare machines might go completely defunct. IoT devices help hospitals avoid such unpleasant scenarios altogether.

The new horizon of the Healthcare Industry

Innovation begins with an ‘I’ and so does IoT, especially in the field of healthcare. The simultaneous growth of these technical aspects has paved the way to the development of treatments that earlier were not thought to be possible. Doctors and researchers have developed the Covid-19 vaccine in a record-breaking time of less than a year. This has been made possible with immense hard work and efforts of researchers as well as several smart gadgets helping to track user data, analyze patterns and help share them across countries instantly. This in itself is no less to a miracle!

However, IoT in healthcare also has its own set of challenges. This includes relative client data security issues, the privacy of patient records, integration of multiple technology devices and their relative protocols, data overload, and expensive initial technology to name a few. Though, solutions to these issues like blockchain in healthcare too are in the pipeline; technology is going to require some more time and evolution to provide patients a seamless and defectless healthcare environment.