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Digital health products and solutions are increasing in scope and function to assist in patient diagnosis, treatment and monitoring, according to a new report by the IQVIA Institute for Human Data Science.
The report found that more solutions are now centered on specific diseases and commercial attraction has increased as developers build offerings that bring value to providers.
In addition, they are more easily unified with health systems and accept innovation, including AI to customize care and lower provider workload.
The report also revealed that product types have increased in size, with health assessment tools such as digital diagnostics, sensor-based digital measures and remote patient monitoring solutions joining digital therapeutics and consumer health apps to provide value for personal health and clinical care.
According to the report, there are now 337,000 digital health apps along with more than 360 software-based digital therapies and 103 digital diagnostics commercially available.
At the same time, the number of AI/machine learning-enabled mobile and point-of-care devices are increasing.
The report also noted that among the 337,000 digital health apps now available, disease-specific apps continue to increase in number. Although many continue to support mental health and patients with diabetes and cardiovascular diseases, newly-launched apps may also help those with visual impairments, auditory issues and dermatologic conditions.
Approvals and adoption of DTx, which treat or reduce disease by delivering a medical intervention, have increased rapidly as opportunities to gain regulatory approval and reimbursement grow.
The report concluded that via the use of digital sensors and wearables, nuanced characteristics of health and patient experience are becoming traceable and measurable in daily life.
Software-based devices that process signals from sensors have quickly opened new routes to assess disease risk, accelerate diagnosis, monitor patient health and evaluate patient prognosis, the report says.
Additionally, digital tools including wearables and symptom-tracking apps are being combined into broader clinical platform offerings for providers to monitor disease progression or response to therapy, detect recurrence and in some cases, predict future health changes to triage patients.
“The landscape of digital health has evolved over the past two years, yielding new products that are more commercially viable and meet the needs of stakeholders across a broadening set of uses,” Murray Aitken, executive director at IQVIA Institute for Human Data Science, said in a statement.
“Digital health tools now support both patients and providers as they move from diagnosis to treatment and disease monitoring, with their scope expanding as new health assessment tools such as digital diagnostics have joined more mature digital therapies, accelerating care and closing gaps to improve health outcomes. Ultimately, these solutions will better fit into existing care pathways and bring benefits to more segments of patients and health systems.”
WHY IT MATTERS
The report found that stakeholders in the digital health ecosystem are working through the regulatory and reimbursement challenges to achieve sustainable investment and scaling of use that will bestow maximum benefits to patients and health systems.
The long-term possibilities for technology-supported and AI/machine learning-driven digital health interventions will continue in spite of near-term challenges, according to the report.
THE LARGER TREND
In 2021, the Morehouse School of Medicine joined forces with United Health Foundation Partners to conduct the Digital Health Tools Study, which assessed how primary care providers, especially those in rural or underserved areas, use health technology and how they feel about it.
Of those digital health tools, telehealth and electronic health records were used by the most providers (65%), followed by patient portals (50%), health information exchanges (45%), prescription drug monitoring programs (40%), remote monitoring programs (30%) and wearable devices (20%).
© 2024 MobiHealthNews is a publication of HIMSS Media
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