Patient-centric model for a successful healthcare system

The last 13th and 14th of October we spent two days in Munich (Germany) to attend the Medical Device Innovation Programme (MDIP).

The MDIP will bring together Medical Device Industry thought leaders to speak on the hottest topics. Experts with diverse backgrounds, shared their perspectives to evaluate the latest strategic and technological advances necessary for profitable, efficient and sustainable product development activities in the field of Medical Devices.

As speaker of the program, our cofounder Mary Franzese had the chance to share our experience and talk about the “Innovations in personal monitoring medical devices and there impact on patient’s life, analyzing old and new challenges in the healthcare innovation”.

“By 2020, we will have a healthcare delivery system that is fully digitized. There will be the emergence of real-time analytics.

Everybody wins from a patient care perspective with improved information sharing and interoperability.”

Joseph Touey, SVP of GlaxoSmithKline  

Today the healthcare sector is facing a digital challenge. Due to the growing industry and consumer expectations, the care models of yesterday are becoming inadequate to face this challenge. On one side we have consumers are demanding transparency, convenience, and value; on the other side, there are physicians that are feeling pressure to meet these expectations. No single model is perfect model, but we know that to be successful a healthcare model needs to include many factors.

Let’s try to analyse what they are.

The first thing is financial success. The healthcare environment, which is financially successful, needs to be sustainable for longer time. The funding can be from Government, otherwise from private or a charitable trust. Financial success is always measured by considering financial data, but the vision and mission are important factors to measure its success. In fact, any change in vision and mission will lead to change in the quality perception.

The advances in technology have changed the way we look at the healthcare system. Technological advancements change the way patients are treated. If the hospitals don’t adapt themselves to these changes, they consequently land up in situation where they have to fight for their survival and existence.

Another important factor is people and their retention. Skilled and qualified persons are considered to be a precious asset for the healthcare systems as if you lose them, you lose everything. They can be a valuable asset only if committed to the vision as well as changing times and trends.

To define a tomorrow’s successful healthcare models, there are some features worthy of consideration. Let’s try to analyze what they are:

• Focused on the patient as a consumer: they will meet the customer experience and understand patients’s need in their everyday lives, using customer relationship management technology to generate and manage demand.
• Predictive, integrated and transparent: using the analytics, caregivers will identify high-risk patients and anticipate problems. In this perspective, the healthcare systems will focus on consistent delivery of evidence-based care at the right time, in the right environment, using the right people.
• Team-based: the healthcare systems will be a point of interaction among patients and clinical team. Thanks to the digital technology, clinical quality, clinical efficiency, patient satisfaction and financial performance will be the pillars of a team-based operating model to disseminate superior standards of care.
• Sustainable: the healthcare systems will integrate processes, technology, and people to transform clinical departments into broader business units focused on the consumer. They will supports different types of risks and quality-based care models, connecting quality measures with reimbursement, and promoting clinical expertise throughout the system of care.

This is what is happening in the healthcare sector. What about the medical technology?

The Medical Devices Industryis changing and growing at rapid pace, bringing more innovation and becoming easier for clinicians to address issues in term of clinical lacks and to reach better outcomes. In recent years it has been shaped by several macro-trends. As a consequence of a digital transformation in health and social care, we have seen an exponential growth of Mobile Apps in healthcare ecosystem. In the same way, Big Data and the Internet of Thing (IoT) have reached deep into the medical device market and led to the domination of the market by a few big manufacturing companies.

In the history of the Medical Device sector, we always consider physicians as the key influencers in buying decisions. However, we have seen an expansion in the number of influencers: hospital groups and payers, such as insurance companies and government agencies, directly or indirectly influence medical device buying decisions. We are also seeing a revolution caused by the Artificial Intelligence (AI), considered as a fundamental predictive enabler to help us solve large-scale problems. Technology giants like IBM and Microsoft have been investing in AI, acquiring smaller companies and trying new technologies.

On the basis of these assumptions, a medical device startup has to face many challenges. The main challenge for Neuron Guard, that is developing a breakthrough medical device, lies in its adoption by the medical community. In fact, introducing an innovation like ours into the medical world will impact on the whole care process, and can meet the resistance of the healthcare professionals. For this reason, we are establishing early collaboration with opinion-leading universities and medical centers (like NHS, and the University of Cambridge).

Another challenge is how to overcome the jeopardy of the good outcome of this venture. In this case, it is of primary importance to secure the intellectual property in the relevant markets. Currently, we have obtained the Italian patent, and the other patent applications – over 12 Countries – are still pending.

One of the most recurring question of the program in Munich was “Where do you see the Medical Devices Industry in the next 5 – 10 years?”. Assuming that there is no limit to the innovation in the Medical Devices Industry, and considering the potential of the digital technology to improve patient care, we are seeing a shift to a patient-centric model: patients are increasingly demanding medical technology, and medical device companies have to shift to the outcome-based model by providing more personalized patient interaction.

Data, even if not directly related to the patient’s vital signs, will be fundamental in the management of the healthcare intervention and can definitely save lives. Patient-centric models are tools to achieve a successful healthcare system, by improving patient outcomes and access to care, and making itself more cost effective. 

Patients will absolutely lead the healthcare environment. 

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This post was originally post by Mary Franzese on LinkedIn

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