How the COVID crisis could spark positive change in healthcare

As we all have seen, COVID-19 is having an unprecedented impact on the world at large. It is taking a huge toll on patients, as well as healthcare staff and systems. But I also see a window of opportunity. Can we collectively seize this moment to spark and accelerate the radical changes needed in healthcare? Can we truly disrupt the way healthcare is being organized, distributed and delivered?

The pressure on global health systems, providers and staff had already been increasing to unsustainable levels, even before this crisis, so I believe we must, and certainly can. Here’s how.

At Philips we’ve been involved in efforts to tackle the COVID-19 crisis from the outset. Worldwide, we have mobilized our resources to ramp up our global production of ventilators and other medical equipment used in the diagnosis and treatment of COVID-19 patients. Additionally, the move to telehealth solutions and the adoption of other digital health technologies has accelerated and is now top of the agenda almost everywhere.

But virtual care is not just about moving care delivery out of the hospital. It’s about acknowledging that our health is largely shaped by what takes place before and after doctor or hospital visits. Remote digital health technology can foster a more holistic and ultimately effective approach to taking care of health and health issues. An approach in which ongoing management of chronic conditions and preventative health strategies are as much a priority as providing care to the critically ill.

Virtual care has surged under COVID-19

How much has changed in just a few months’ time. The Future Health Index 2019 report showed that telehealth had yet to become a common part of healthcare professionals’ day-to-day work, with 39% saying they did not currently use telehealth in their practice or hospital.

Today, it seems like telehealth has gone from "nice to have" to a necessity. In a recent Frost & Sullivan report it was noted that we’re experiencing a “radical telehealth expansion”. In the US, the pre-COVID-19 projected 2019-2025 compound annual growth rate was estimated at just over 28%, while now this has gone up to almost 40%, with remote patient monitoring alone projected to grow 150% just this year.

Investments in the digitization of care used to be a complicating factor. These typically substantial initial investments were unlikely to produce immediate results, so for budget holders, payers and healthcare institutions there often was no direct financial incentive to make them. Today, we see widespread reimbursement models for telehealth services, clinical use cases of virtual care going from limited population segments to literally everyone, and business model development going from reactive to proactive.

But of course, technology is not a panacea: healthcare transformation has to go beyond the adoption of digital health technologies alone. All stakeholders will also need to join forces and focus on the following factors to successfully transform healthcare:

I sincerely hope that – once the pandemic subsides to manageable levels – we can use the lessons of this crisis to spark much-needed transformation. Providing patient-centric, outcome-based virtual care depends on the active involvement of multiple actors – healthcare professionals, the general population, payers, regulators and the private sector. The bottleneck is not the technology, but, in many areas, change management.

We have to act decisively, together, in an orchestrated way, to make the necessary changes. By helping to unite the industry and stakeholder community behind a common roadmap, I am convinced we will be much further along the path to delivering better and more sustainable care.