Have you ever Zoom called a doctor? Whether your answer is yes or no, you probably had moments in your life when you needed to visit a health practitioner.
But are the trips to healthcare facilities worth it? According to American Medical Association and Wellness Council of America, nearly 3 out of 4 visits to medical care facilities are either unnecessary or could be handled over a call. That being said, “the telehealth market is still relatively immature, highly complex, and full of uninitiated buyers” (Sage & Partners, 2017).
The global telemedicine market size was estimated at 41.4 billion USD in 2019. It was only a fraction of the healthcare industry. With stimulus like COVID 19 and 5G, the immense growth potential is slowly being realized.
Before we dig in, perhaps it’s better to take a look at the definition of telemedicine. The word telemedicine is sometimes used interchangeably with telehealth. But Askhlaghi and Asadi (2002) distinguished the two words.
“Telemedicine utilizes information and telecommunications technology to transfer medical information for diagnosis, therapy and education.”
“Telehealth is the use of information and communication technologies to transfer healthcare information for the delivery of clinical, administrative and educational services.”
The key difference lies on the information being transmitted. For simplicity, one could say that telemedicine mainly concerns clinical content while telehealth takes care of everything else. The common feature is they both rely on telecommunication technologies.
By the above definition, telemedicine is more than just video calling your doctor. This term also covers the transfer of X-ray images, readings of monitoring devices, and treatment history, to name a few. In some cases, telesurgery could also be performed with the help of medical robotics.
Needless to say, the industry is heavily reliant on digital technologies. The latest development in telecommunication technology, namely 5G, is bound to make an impact on telemedicine. Here’s how:
5G is more than just an improved mobile communication network. Its hyper connectivity and minimum latency create possibilities for the application of big data, AI, IoT and cloud computing in telemedicine. Connected devices at home can collect and transfer sufficient health-related data for algorithms to provide smart healthcare solutions. Instructions could be sent back momentarily and executed in real time. Diagnostic imaging can receive highly accurate results in the blink of an eye. More patients can undertake VR-enabled therapeutic sessions. Doctors or even virtual doctors can assess patients’ real time health parameters during video consultation. Nonetheless, 5G’s limitation is also apparent. With focus on increased performance, the early development of 5G sacrifices coverage. Bounded availability narrows its initial disruption on the telemedicine market.
References:
Akhlaghi, H., & Asadi, H. (2002). Essentials of telemedicine and telecare. Chichester: Wiley.
Sage & Partners. (2017) http://sage-growth.com/index.php/2017/04/making-the-connection-is-the-telehealth-market-ripe-for-a-boom/
