Healthcare is an important part of a society as it impacts significantly on a country's economic growth, development and industrialization. A healthy workforce produces more products and services while the healthcare workforce helps the population keep healthy.
Challenges: Burnout and Global Workforce Shortage in Healthcare Industry
Healthcare professionals with medical expertise and resources strive to improve patient health outcomes. However, these professionals all over the world are facing numerous challenges. Covid-19 pandemic added immense pressure on doctors and nurses in caring for patients more than ever before. Long working hours, exposure to the virus, and stress as caring for seriously ill patients under difficult circumstances have all contributed to increased mental and physical health of healthcare professionals.
Many surveys indicate that the healthcare professionals are concerned about a global shortage of doctors and nurses. Many healthcare professionals have indicated they have an intention to leave their job or change roles to non-clinical jobs as a result of burnout. This can lead to increased workloads for remaining staffs, reduced quality of care, and even medical errors.
Solutions: Well-Being Support and Technological Advancements
To reverse the challenge, the healthcare professionals are calling for better well-being support, as well as time allocation to train and adopt new technological solutions that will improve their efficiency, reduce workload, free up time and prevent technology from becoming burdensome in near future. The healthcare industry has seen rapid technology advancements in recent years.
- From electronic health records to telemedicine, new technologies are transforming the way healthcare is delivered and improving patient outcomes.
- Big data, a new rise in healthcare where technology has a significant impact is the use of artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning. AI and machine learning algorithms can analyze vast amounts of patient data to identify patterns and trends that can be used to improve diagnosis and treatment. For instance, AI can help doctors identify early signs of disease or predict which treatments are most likely to be effective for a particular patient.
- Another area where technology is being used to improve healthcare is in the development of medical devices and wearables. These devices can monitor patient health in real-time, providing doctors with important data to help them make informed decisions about treatment.
Challenges of Digital Health
However, to achieve a successful digital transformation in the healthcare sector is not a simple matter of technical changes.
It requires a complex adaptive change in human attitudes, skills as well as in the healthcare organization and the related legal and financial frameworks. Digital technologies only provide the tools and cannot transform the healthcare sector on its own but need to be put to productive use by the healthcare professionals and patients.
Healthcare software companies have a fairly narrow band for delivering their software to end-user healthcare professionals, normally it has to go through the hospital managers or clinic chain managers. As a health tech startup, we determine a key solution at scale.
SEADOC’s Call-To-Action: One Stop Digital Platform
SEADOC’s mission is to empower healthcare professionals to deliver better experiences through digitization. We develop a cloud-based medical network that allows accredited healthcare providers to transform the way that they care online. The platform allows them to connect, collaborate with healthcare team members on patient care and communicate with patients through one stop platform.
However, it’s still important to understand the growing challenges and:
- What can we do to help prepare healthcare professionals for the next decade?
- What skills will be required to provide the best care for patients?
- How will care be provided?
- And how will technological developments impact healthcare?
SEADOC looks forward to collaborating with healthcare leaders, institutions and professionals to notice the future challenges and find ways to support healthcare providers in healthcare digitization in the next years ahead.
