Healthcare goes Digi – overall compliance needed

Fondia has interviewed 40 companies in 13 industries, over the last two years, to learn from their digital experience and future views. Healthcare companies are investing heavily into digital transformation. However, the interviewees don’t see any quick changes in the industry but do predict that digitalization will happen step by step and inevitably. The most important internal factor driving the change is cost-efficiency acquired through more automated processes.

The interviewed companies have faced some difficulties in recruiting people and facing problems from the customers side, i.e. there are difficulties when adopting new technology. Finding doctors with medical and technological skills and the right mindset has proven to be challenging. More specifically, they have noted difficulties finding people with good knowledge of virtual reality (VR) applications. New business models have also faced some change resistance from customers. E-appointments still require a change in attitudes because people are used to face-to-face meetings and being tested in hospitals and medical spaces.

Another challenge that especially start-up companies are facing when trying to enter the traditional healthcare industry is the scope and complexity of the regulation. The interviewed companies hope that the legislators would be more involved in the development of new services, products and service models to ensure that legislation wouldn’t prevent the potential of new technologies from being used in practice.

The companies foresee that in the future the focus is to improve existing services and products even further. They also emphasized the importance of using data to improve services. The healthcare industry will benefit a lot from new technologies which will allow creation of more tailored health services, for example, more comprehensive data collection and analytics which may enable systems to predict diseases, or the risk of diseases, before any symptoms. Moreover, the use of machines for the diagnosis will diminish the risk of human error. The interviewees identified that most important technologies in the future are Robotics, Artificial Intelligence (AI), Big Data, and patient self-service.

Is Healthcare related to your business? On our extensive Digireport, you can read more of our key findings and recommendations for companies to follow from a legal perspective. The areas covered in more detail are as follows:

• Get organized with company´s business models, processes and contract templates, including applicable regulation and compliance.

• Your industry is regulated one, however, more legal interpretations may exist as new products or services do not fit with the existing regulatory framework.

• Protect your data, brand and other intellectual property rights. Remember product safety and product liability. Pay attention to local marketing and consumer protection law.

• With funded projects and cooperation – make clear agreements and define ownerships and licensing rights, remember the exit clauses.

• With increased data collection, comes increased responsibility. All health-related data is considered sensitive data.

• Take good care of your people! Do positive navigation of managing HR matters and Digi related changes in the overall working culture and environment.

We hope that you find it useful and it helps your business on its digital journey. Download the full report from here.

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