Healthcare Tech Trends of 2022: Part I

There is a steady and constant emergence of new technologies within the healthcare industry. Whether it’s new gene therapies being used to treat conditions such as sickle cell disease or artificial intelligence tools that are changing the way that we monitor individual health, there is a multitude of ways in which healthcare professionals are striving to help people live healthier lives.

The global pandemic created an urgency for tech companies to apply their resources and expertise in order to solve the problems that Covid-19 created. Many healthcare organizations there weren’t considered actual tech companies began to focus their efforts on technology and how it could be used to change how products and services were delivered.

There is no argument that the pandemic fast-tracked the digitization of the healthcare industry. In fact, 80% of healthcare providers have plans in place to increase their investment in digital and technology solutions over the next five years.

There will be major growth in personalized medicine, genomics, wearable technology, and telemedicine. Things such as cloud computing, the internet of things (IoT), extender reality (XR), and artificial intelligence (AI) are being leveraged every day in order to improve services and deliver new treatments.

TELEMEDICINE AND REMOTE HEALTHCARE

During the early stages of the pandemic healthcare consultations that were conducted remotely increased by nearly 40%. Aside from the obvious reason of avoiding the spread of communicable disease, there are a number of reasons to develop further the ability to remotely examine, diagnose and treat patients. There are regions of the world that deal with serious shortages of doctors, and many other regions that are simply too rural to have full access to medical treatment.

Telemedicine technology helped create virtual hospital wards, which were established during the pandemic and used to monitor and treat multiple patients from their respective homes. New generation wearables technologies have enabled doctors to monitor vital signs in real-time. As we move towards the end of 2022 there will be an expansion in the use of machine learning, robots, and IoT to alert professionals of the need for medical intervention.

EXTENDED REALITY (XR) FOR CLINICAL TRAINING

Extended reality or XR is used to cover augmented reality, mixed reality, and virtual reality. These technologies involve headsets or lenses that alter the user’s perception of the world around them. In the healthcare sector, these applications have the potential to transform the way that we train medical professionals and deliver treatments to patients.

Virtual reality headsets are currently being used by many organizations to train doctors and surgeons without the requirement of medical cadavers. The technology allows the students to be introduced and intimately acquainted with the human body without putting human beings at risk.

Furthermore, virtual reality can be used in treatment. Whether VR is used as a therapy tool for children with autism to develop coping and social skills or facilitating cognitive behavior therapy (CBT) to improve anxiety or chronic pain, the applications of VR in healthcare are endless!

This article was originally posted on Ines Dahne-Steuber.