Top 10 Fastest-Growing Healthcare Tech Companies, 2021

Top

1

Fastest-Growing

HEALTHCARE

TECH

Companies,

2021 Tech Marvels

5 Biggest Technological Advancements in the Healthcare Sector

Digital Diagnosis Is telemedicine here to stay?

Jim Sholeff Chief Execu ve Officer

Claimocity Innovation that Empowers Medical Professionals VOL 09 ISSUE 02 2021

COVID-19 and the Healthcare Space: A Cause-and-Effect Scenario

I

t would be an emotion-driven exaggeration when we say that the worst of environmental degradation or even a massive asteroid collision couldn’t do what the COVID-19 pandemic has done so far. It trampled the earth in its entirety, bringing the whole of humanity to the confines of our homes and almost pushing us back into dark ages — summarizing the emotions of those who’ve lost their loved ones, their jobs, and much more.

With speculations of a third wave still instilling fear, humanity has changed for both the better and the worse in quite a few ways. While the likes of work-from-home, buy-at-home (e-commerce), no-contact buying, selling, and so on are expected, they have left their tell-tale signs and effects in the healthcare and related industries.

A few other prominent changes worth noting include: Shifting Focus on Remote Care Prior to the pandemic’s act of bulldozing healthcare infrastructures worldwide, the norm was to hospitalize patients if home care could not suffice. With the pandemic overwhelming most hospitals, newer forms of remote treatments came to light for the first time.

The prominent ones of such treatments included shifting patients to specially created facilities, either close to or at a distance from the main hospital and treating even confirmed COVID-19 patients in the confines of their home once their condition stabilized.

Going forward, out-patient could be the standard with the availability of 3rd party nursing staff from independent registered sources. This could be an immense help to the healthcare facility by letting them treat only the most critical of cases.

Virtual Consultations - Telehealth The healthcare space, post the pandemic, is seeing an ascending use of online and remote consultation for every manner of treatment. Be it common diseases, stomach ailments, sore throats, dental issues to mental health,

everything can today be treated virtually without the need to visit a medical facility.

While mobile applications have come about giving a line of sight to patients and healthcare professionals, what has truly added to make it a viable option, are wearable devices and emergency health records that are kept on the cloud.

With these in place, a visit to a healthcare facility may shortly be deemed unnecessary with the physician knowing in exact terms the condition of a patient and prescribing the right course of action with or without medication and required support.

IoT-enabled wearables While wearables were always around for close to half a decade, in the form of distance trackers, heart-rate trackers, and others that did rudimentary activities, things took a steep climb in the wearables market during the initial period of the pandemic.

What this has led to is a plethora of devices as far apart as the Apple Watch, WHOOP Strap, Fitbit, Zephyr, BioHarness, and the likes. These could indicate physiological changes, heart rate and its variability, resting rate and respiration, stress, activity, and sleep.

Integrated together, it could exhibit signal-to-noise ratios (SNR) that may predict things out of sync and help take corrective actions right when they are most needed.

Wearables, in fact, are a separate science, given that they are the first line of information that feeds storages in the cloud for accurate and often pin-pointed medications to save lives.

This edition—Top 10 Fastest-Growing Healthcare Tech Companies, 2021—brings to your desk a listing of innovative companies striving to design and deliver cutting-edge products and solutions. If you’re enthusiastic about understanding just how many opportunities the healthtech space has to offer, read ahead!

- Sumita Sarkar

Editor’s Note

CoreHealth Technologies

Enabling Transformative Corporate Wellness Programs

Cylera Safeguarding What Matters Most for Healthcare Organizations

Innovaccer Inc. Simplifying Healthcare Data Services

Medefer Disrupting the Telehealth Spacewith Innovative Technology

36

CxO CxO

David Boucher

16 24 28 40

CONTENTS

08

Cover Story

Innovation that Empowers Medical Professionals

20

Articles Articles

32

Tech Marvels

Digital Diagnosis

5 Biggest Technological Advancements in the Healthcare Sector

Is telemedicine here to stay?

Editor-in-Chief Senior Editor

Sumita Sarkar Anish Miller

Managing Editor

Trishika Rokade

Assisting Editors

Ashlesh, Abhishek

Visualiser Art & Picture Editor Co-designer Art & Design Assistant Business Development Manager Marketing Manager

David King Rohil Shinganapurkar Paul Belin Mrunalinee Deshmukh Amy Jones John Smith Sarah Wilson, John Smith, Alex Vincent

Business Development Executives Sales Executives

Kelli, Bill, Anna

Technical Head Assistant Technical Head Technical Consultants

Jacob Smile Pratiksha Patil David, Robert

Digital Marketing Manager Assistant Digital Marketing Manager SME-SMO Executives

Alina Sege Amol Wadekar Atul, Gemson

Research Analyst Circulation Manager

Eric Smith Tanaji

sales@insightscare.com

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Company Name

Featuring

Description

Carequality carequality.org

Dave Cassel Executive Director

Carequality has brought together the entire healthcare industry to overcome this challenge by providing a national-level, consensus-built, common interoperability framework to enable exchange between and among health data sharing networks.

Claimocity Software claimocity.com

Jim Sholeff CEO

Claimocity is AI-driven smart software that automates many of the billing and administrative processes so that the bulk of the daily work is done for you

CoreHealth Technologies corehealth.global

Anne Marie Kirby Co-founder and CEO

CoreHealth Technologies was founded in 2004, inspired by the idea of keeping people healthy and how technology and design drive success.

Cylera cylera.com

Timur Ozekcin Co-founder and CEO

Cylera is the leading edge in IoT and medical device security, with enhanced intelligence.

Doc Abode docabode.com

Taz Aldawoud Founder and CEO

Doc Abode’s vision is to develop innovative solutions to support the NHS workforce of the future, transforming healthcare delivery to meet increasing demand and complex needs of its patients.

Innovaccer innovaccer.com

Ankit Maheshwari Founding Member, President, R&D and India Operations

Innovaccer Inc. is a leading San Francisco-based healthcare technology company committed to helping healthcare care as one.

Medefer medefer.com

Dr Bahman Nedjat-Shokouhi CEO and Founder

Medefer is a virtual healthcare provider to the NHS, using innovative technology to support early specialist-led patient care.

Medicalchain medicalchain.com

Abdullah Albeyatti CEO and Co-founder

Medicalchain uses blockchain technology to create a userfocused electronic health record whilst maintaining a single true version of the user’s data.

myBeepr mybeepr.com

Krupa Bhagani Co-founder

myBeepr is revolutionising Australian healthcare by introducing a communication platform that brings care teams together.

Written Medicine writtenmedicine.com

Tucker McGaw Global Head of Technology and Director

Written Medicine was founded in 2012 on the principles of increasing patient access to medical information.

C O V E R S T O R Y

Jim Sholeff Chief Execu ve Officer Claimocity

Innovation that Empowers Medical Professionals

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When you are discussing tens to hundreds of thousands of dollars being lost annually to inefcient and outdated processes, it is critical that decision makers have access to the key information they need to make an informed decision.

One of the most fascinating modern applications of healthcare technology injects the current evolution of machine learning into historically burdensome administrative and billing systems, utilizing the processing power of custom artificial intelligence designs to streamline complex workflows and handle a huge array of ancillary needs in a manner that enables doctors to shift their primary focus back to simply providing the highest quality of patient care.

This edition of the Top 10 Fastest Growing Healthcare Tech Companies of 2021 puts the spotlight on those organizations that facilitate the conjunction between medicine and tech by innovating products and solutions with the potential to change lives.

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When COVID struck, we were able to move 88.3% of the billing and coding workforce around the globe to fully secure work environments with no signicant downtime or loss of production.

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he intermingled conjunction between healthcare and technology, from the invention of the pacemaker to the modern methodologies of leveraging big data to evaluate diagnostic probabilities, provides a critical foundation for forward-thinking medicine to build upon.

Top 10 Fastest-Growing Healthcare Tech Companies, 2021

Formed in 2016 after nearly two decades of research and product development, Claimocity emerged with a singular purpose – to properly service the hospital-based community of doctors.

Listening to the needs of the physicians and practice managers, the company systematically identified every key pain point that was not being addressed. Then it isolated the variables and created the AI-enhanced tools, processes, and specialized teams needed to solve them.

“Our mission is to ensure that hospital and facility-based doctors are able to get more done in less time with better results – and collect 100% of what they have earned,” says Jim Sholeff, the Chief Executive Officer.

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Our mission is to ensure that hospital and facility-based doctors are able to get the most done in the least time with the best results – and collect 100% of what they have earned.

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One prominent name among such companies is Claimocity, an AI-driven mobile practice management software platform built by veteran RCM medical billing service experts specifically to save high value time and make rounding doctor’s lives easier.

Setting Benchmarks While they provide an array of highly regarded stand-alone options from charge capture to individual PM tools, Claimocity’s highest value offering rests in its all-in-one software and services solution, which reduces a physician practice from multiple vendors, integrations, and billing teams (in house or outsourced) to a single seamless end-toend practical solution for clinical, administrative, financial, and managerial needs.

“One of the key advantages to a single high performing solution are the complete absence of integration stuck points, revenue gaps, and information loss issues that arise where multiple systems meet,” says Jim. “By having a seamless flow from the point of care or system origin point to the claim completion and reporting functionality, there is a significant level of added intelligence and analysis available that increases efficiency and productivity opportunities while enabling the identification of growth and refinement points.”

“When you combine this level of data availability with a machine learning overlay and the higher processing power of artificial intelligence, and then run all of that through a robust support staff and multi-tiered levels of billing and audit teams, you get an unrivaled combination of experience and horsepower.”

“For example, with AI-enhanced quality control measures we can virtually eliminate lost, missing, or erroneous charges as well as identify coding inefficiencies that either result in lower revenue than the encounter should be generating or over coding audit risks that the provider and practice should be aware of,” he adds.

One of the revolutionary new offerings Claimocity has, is the Progress Note Generator. Jim and the team state that the name is deceptively mild in comparison to the functionality and ability to save doctors money on other software.

To give a brief explanation, when a doctor sees a patient and an encounter happens, a doctor needs to generate a note into the EHR and provide administrative documentation about the encounter for billing purposes. These two separate things must happen for the physician to meet the medical requirements of the visit, and to get paid – the necessary administrative and billing duality behind every encounter.

Claimocity combined the two into a single mobile workflow that integrates into the facility data system, saving high value time and eliminating the need for a practice side EHR for hospitalists.

The progress note generator (SOAP note generator) is built into the company’s charge capture workflow for practice

The custom rules engine and personalized software enables a wide array of easily modified templates, note cloning from past visits, note cloning from other coverage physicians, practice- or physician-level adjustments, and so much more.

“Every rounding doctor who has seen it in the demo so far has been thrilled by the possible applications and opportunities so it is one of those small changes that can have a big impact on so many workloads. And that’s truly what Claimocity is all about, making some meaningful changes that help the daily lives of rounding doctors,” Jim exclaims.

Exemplary Expertise Jim Sholeff, the CEO, has been critical to Claimocity’s success, and as a founder member of the company, has been hands-on in product development, infrastructure development, and evolution of the company.

Jim’s leadership and vision have been two vital components in not only the steep upwards trajectory Claimocity has seen since the initial startup, but also the drive for massive internal growth that keeps everyone looking for new ways to improve small details, hit higher marks on already industry leading benchmarks, and to find new ways to provide higher value for the company’s existing customers.

His hands-on approach makes him a favorite of new clients and interested parties who gravitate to his knowledge base and charm during demos and follow-ups.

In his advice to those aspiring to venture into the HealthTech space, Jim says, “Think outside the box and focus on detailed specialized values rather than broader solutions. The giants of the industry have had decades building recognizable brands and are very good at providing solutions to the broader markets. But when you provide products and services designed to cover as many customer bases as possible, you inevitably leave gaps where the solutions fall short.”

“For example, physician software covers a huge range of specialties and needs. And while some solutions overlap well across a variety of specialties, there are inevitably going to be certain segments of the market are going to find

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Our highest value offering rests in our all-in-one software and services solution, which reduces a physician practice from multiple vendors and integrations to a single seamless end-to-end practical solution clinical, administrative, nancial, and managerial needs.

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management customers so that the same process they use for capturing a charge also generates, shares, and fulfills the progress note requirement in the facility EHR.

that their needs are not fully met. In fact, that is the very basis for Claimocity.”

“We noticed that hospital and facility-based physicians were having to utilize software and systems designed for office-based doctors but there are significant differences in workloads and workflows between physicians who primarily see patients in singular medical office settings and those who primarily perform encounters on the go in clinical settings like hospitals, step down rehabilitation facilities, skilled nursing centers, and other acute and subacute environments. To help them thrive, we systematically provided a set of products exclusively designed for their needs, Overcoming Adversities Talking about how the COVID-19 pandemic impacted the HealthTech sector and how Claimocity pivoted to the remote setting to sustain operations, Jim says, “The effects of the pandemic on the healthcare sector have been brutal and we provided a great deal of support to our customers

who in turn, are doing the same for their customers. Our doctors, physician groups and surgeons were heavily impacted in so many ways, whether from having contracted the virus and nearly succumbed, to having to temporarily shut down facilities, to undergoing massive shifts in their business models and personal approaches to their work, to the emotional toll it takes on them to be frontline responders to all the tragedies and constant state of turmoil and struggle that comes with such loss and pain.”

“Here at Claimocity, we were fortunate to have the infrastructure and resources in place to shift to remote with minimal impacts, and in fact our team really stepped up to support each other and logistically manage a massive transformation with no measurable downtime.”

“For example, when COVID struck, we were able to move 88.3% of the medical billing and coding workforce around the globe to fully secure work environments with no significant loss of production. To put this in perspective, that’s thousands of people shifting from central hubs to independent locations requiring new equipment, new software, different wireless connections, security

implementation measures, new SOPs, lines of communications, and clear plans of action.”

“To have less than a 3-hour downtime was a real testament to the dedication we have to both our team and our clients.

Since we measure over 100+ in-process metrics, we were able to monitor how the physical changes impacted the data and trend lines, and we were so proud of the team to see the numbers not drop off but rise slightly as everyone banded together to do more and cover for each other,” Jim expressed.

Exhibiting Excellence Pertaining to Claimocity’s specific focus on hospital and facility-based physicians the company has received several notable recognitions from peer reviews and industry segments focused on hospitalists, physiatrists, inpatient psychiatrists, and rounding clinicians.

Today’s Hospitalist rated Claimocity head and shoulders above the rest as the top mobile charge capture app, as did

PracticeSuite and Alliance for Academic Internal Medicine (AAIM), and the company saw a handful of other similar recognitions and awards from review based digital publications for their practice management tools and billing claims processing services.

“It’s amazing to get noticed for all the hard work we are doing as there are a lot of people in Claimocity working ceaselessly to put forth not just good products but amazing ones that they continue to refine and improve in every way possible,” Jim expresses.

“It is really a testament to the entire team when we get recognitions, but it is also an important aspect for us to increase awareness among hospitalists and rounding physicians that they don’t have to leave critical time and money on the table. When you are discussing tens to hundreds of thousands of dollars being lost annually to inefficient and outdated processes, it is critical that decision makers have access to the key information they need to make an informed decision,” he adds.

Towards a Successful Future We asked Jim about his vision for scaling Claimocity’s operations and offerings in 2021 to which he said, “This is a great question and one that really strikes a chord. We have some big things in the works that have been in R&D for several years now and are in the final stages of development that are going to change the industry. Many times, a company will say ‘change the industry’ but in reality, the results fall far short of the hype. In this case, I am understating the possible impact as there are simply no other products like it in the market in any specialty and it should become the centerpiece of the company moving forward. Because of the timing, it is not yet ready for disclosure, but I think it will be a fun topic to discuss in next year’s interview.”

“As for general thoughts on scaling, we have already seen strong growth in the last year, and especially in the last six months, and we have so many irons in the fire that it will be exciting to see how many of them, we can complete and roll out in the final two quarters of 2021,” concludes Jim.

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CoreHealth is continuously working on upgrading our big data capabilities and analysis to help health and well-being providers that also recognize its value.

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Anne Marie Kirby Co-founder & CEO

16|September 2021|www.insightscare.com

Enabling Transformative Corporate Wellness Programs

T

echnology has always been a pivotal part of human evolution and evidently, healthcare has been on a parallel path.

As health remains a significant part of our lives, we must constantly take care of our body, so that diseases stay outside the door.

Selected healthcare companies are decrypting the meaning of improving lives, finding transformative solutions, and helping people enjoy a healthy life.

In the following interview, Anne Marie Kirby, the Cofounder & CEO of CoreHealth Technologies briefs us about the company’s contribution towards the health, wellness & fitness niche. She also briefs us about the challenges that CoreHealth faced, alongside a few details about the company’s journey to becoming one of the fastest-growing healthcare tech companies in 2021.

Below are the highlights of the interview: Please brief our audience about your company, its mission, and the key aspects of its stronghold within the healthcare technology services niche.

CoreHealth Technologies was founded in 2004, inspired by the idea of keeping people healthy and how technology and design drive success. Since its inception, CoreHealth has become the leading corporate wellness platform trusted by over 1000 organizations, from medium-sized businesses to Fortune 500 companies, and serves over 3 million employees worldwide in multiple languages.

technology and world-class support. We believe that developing the best employee well-being programs is all about giving health and wellness companies the right code, design, and access to the latest innovations. With the most customizations, integrations, and reliability of any software in its class, CoreHealth’s powerful platform lets our customers focus on growing great companies.

Tell us more about the offerings that give your company a distinctive edge to stand out from the competition?

CoreHealth’s all-in-one corporate wellness platform is a SaaS solution that brings all your wellness program components into one place. Health Assessments, biometric management, challenges, content management, education, self-help programs, coach facilitation, incentives, surveys, social networking – and more! We specialize in integrating with third-party, best-in-class wellness vendors via our Integrated Marketplace of 140+ unique wellness innovations. Customers can mix and match or use their own vendor with seamless access from within the CoreHealth platform.

CoreHealth’s software powers health and well-being programs for corporate wellness companies, insurers, health coaching companies, employee assistance providers, group benefits brokers, human resources consulting firms, and health systems. Our technology is white labeled so customers can tailor, brand, and re-sell our technology to corporate employers around the world. We do not provide wellness services – just the technology, so our customers know their programs are always cutting edge and can

At CoreHealth, our mission is to revolutionize health and performance in the workplace with our total well-being

17|September 2021|www.insightscare.com

Top 10 Fastest-Growing Healthcare Tech Companies, 2021 constantly evolve to meet the unique needs of every client.

What is your opinion on the effects of the current pandemic on the healthcare sector, and what challenges did you face during the initial phase of the pandemic?

The pandemic shone a spotlight on the need for more preventative care measures. High-risk individuals struggling with obesity, diabetes, or heart disease, for example, had far worse health outcomes once becoming sick with COVID-19. Although there are preventative strategies in place for many chronic diseases like these, they are grossly underutilized. We need to continue to find ways to better influence positive behavior change to help mitigate these risks.

We also noticed that the pandemic forced many organizations to quickly adapt their services to provide an online approach to their participants. Telehealth services have become considerably more accepted by the public since the onset of the pandemic, and I believe we will see continued growth in this area. We have seen a substantial increase in organizations embracing this approach and I do not believe healthcare will return to in-person services seen prior to COVID-19.

This is especially true for our own customers. Many had to quickly pivot their programs such as coaching programs from an in-person experience to a virtual one with very limited notice. One of our only challenges during this time was assisting and guiding all our customers who wanted to make the transition from coaching to online fitness programs. Fortunately, we have been a virtual company for over 17 years and were well-positioned to provide this support. We already had the platform-tools in place, we just needed to educate our customers on how to implement them.

With continuous development in technologies such as AI and big data, what is your prediction about the future of the healthcare software services market?

I think the potential for AI to help solve clinical trial challenges and create instantaneous medical treatment plans is currently being underutilized in the market. There are big opportunities to better harness the power of AI and big data to analyze, interpret, and predict more suitable outcomes through monitoring big data sets and staying apprised of those results. By doing so we could better assist doctors on creating more robust and accurate treatment plans.

As an established leader, what would be your advice to the budding entrepreneurs and enthusiasts aspiring to venture into the healthcare software services niche?

Prevention is a key area of healthcare that is in need of better solutions. People are increasingly recognizing the value of preventative care not only for economic and financial reasons but also as a social enterprise endeavor for the general well-being of the public. However, underutilization of preventative services is mainly due to an engagement gap rather than an information gap.

Promoting positive behavior change to effectively manage chronic diseases is a complex challenge that requires multifaceted strategies to increase engagement rates in prevention programs. Unfortunately, we still have a long way to go to improve the problem and need all brain power to come up with novel solutions!

How do you envision scaling your company’s operations and offerings in 2021?

CoreHealth is continuously working on upgrading our big data capabilities and analysis to help health and well-being providers that also recognize its value. We are also working on techniques for quantifying certain preventative health solutions by obtaining metabolic and stress level rates. Our goal is to increase the public’s acceptance and desire to work with these solutions by using promising accessibility methods that will help promote usability. Stay tuned for some exciting announcements about this in the near future!

About Anne Marie Kirby Anne Marie Kirby is the Founder and CEO of CoreHealth Technologies. Recognized as a leading female entrepreneur by national awards panels, Anne Marie has been at the forefront of health and wellness innovation -- leading the team in developing sophisticated corporate wellness technology that empowers the wellness innovators of tomorrow.

CoreHealth Technologies’ origins were inspired by Anne Marie who faced past health challenges that made her realize the need for preventive health solutions to help people improve their overall well-being. Using her expertise as a software engineer and her independent and initiative-seeking attitude, she wrote a software program to track and analyze food ingredients. Her passion to find a solution for her ailment motivates her to serve a purpose much bigger than herself and the industry she continuously contributes to.

18|September 2021|www.insightscare.com

Exhibi ng True Excellence CoreHealth has received the following recogni on: • CoreHealth Technologies Makes Rocket Builders 2020 Announced April 2020 Ready to Rocket Digital Health List

by Rocket Builders • Announced March 2019 - CoreHealth Technologies Makes Rocket Builders 2019 Ready to Rocket Digital Health List by Rocket Builders, a unique business recogni on list that profiles technology companies with the greatest poten al for growth.

• Announced September 25, 2018 - CoreHealth Receives 2019 Canadian Business Excellence Award and Ranks on 2018 Growth 500 • Announced September 6, 2018 - CoreHealth CEO Anne Marie Kirby Named 1 of 30 Most Inspira onal Leaders to Watch in 2018

Currently, prevention is an underrated solution to medical problems around the world. Additionally, prevention could save billions of taxpayer dollars when people take personal initiative and have the right tools at their disposal to make the best decision regarding their long-term health.

Hence, Anne Marie and CoreHealth Technologies are transforming the world and raising the bar for every business leader with their work.

• Announced March 16, 2018 - CoreHealth Technologies Makes Rocket Builders 2018 Ready to Rocket Digital Health List by Rocket Builders, a unique business recogni on list that profiles technology companies with the greatest poten al for growth.

• Announced Oct 2017 - CoreHealth Receives the 2017/2018 Technology Award by CorporateLiveWire • Announced Sept 27, 2017 - CoreHealth Receives 2018 Canadian Business Excellence Award for demonstra ng a strategic approach to successfully improving business performance and achieving goals. Announced Sept 9, 2017 - CoreHealth on 2017 Profit 500 List of Canada's Fastest-Growing Companies - Ranked No. 337 • Announced April 4, 2017 - CoreHealth Named one of the 30 Most Innova ve Companies to Watch by Insights Success.

• Announced March 7, 2017 - Rocket Builders - CoreHealth Technologies Makes Rocket Builders 2017 Ready to Rocket Digital Health List.

19|September 2021|www.insightscare.com

Biggest

5 Health

Technological

Advancements in the

Sector T

he world and its history are proof that the invention and discovery of something have helped humans in building or improving the human lifestyle and healthcare system. Let that be the industrial revolution that gave rise to various machinery and equipment in the healthcare system or the current technical area; it has eased and improved the healthcare sector immensely.

The healthcare system is complicated, and since the world is moving at an unprecedented rate, it is also changing fast. The trends which you think are old today are here to stay and conquer another market. Over the years, technology has been a huge help in improving the healthcare sector. From helping the doctors to provide the result with better accuracy and precision to giving the freedom of tracking down personal health, the technology in the healthcare sector has transformed exceptionally.

The inclusion of technology in our lives has helped us through improved treatment, medication, and prevention. Technology actually has the power to transform lives, and with different medical equipment like smartwatches and chatbots, it is clearly doing a great job.

Here are five examples that showcase the power of technology in the healthcare industry.

20|September 2021|www.insightscare.com

are

Tech Marvels

21|September 2021|www.insightscare.com

Ÿ Chatbots

What is the first thing that one does while dealing with a common cold? Of course, the option of going and consulting the doctor is always available and reliable, but what is something that one does even before taking that step?

The world has become highly digital, and the COVID-19 pandemic has taught us to care for ourselves by ourselves.

Before taking any decision, humans tend to generally ask a question about health on a genuine website or Google. That has given rise to chatbots. Chatbots with AI have significantly helped patients all over the world.

This technology that chats with the patient and helps them with their problems, along with providing the required assistance to the patient, is also helping in saving a trip to the practitioner.

Providing primary healthcare based on Artificial Intelligence, the technology has maintained all-in-one communication and made the difference in efficiency, speed, and assisting with primary care to people all around the world. Ÿ Wearable Technology

The trend which recently gained popularity from two industries is wearable and fashion technology. This is also one of the best examples of how the fashion, technology, and healthcare industries can wonderfully collaborate and provide a solution that could solve many problems at once.

Wearable technologies are not just limited to the heavily popular smartwatches and the smart bands; new technology has come up with smart rings that allow monitoring on a personal level. For example, the ring measure the blood rate of the mother as well as the child. Along with that, it also monitors the heart movement and even period monitoring for couples who are trying to conceive. Ÿ Social Media

Who knew that Social Media would become a place to discuss medical health and a great platform to communicate with the young generation of the world? Social media is more than just a tool to communicate. Few of the entrepreneurs have come up with innovative ideas that close the gap between the patient and the doctor.

Even doctors have started using social media platforms like Instagram, Facebook, and WhatsApp to provide medical assistance to patients. The COVID-19 pandemic situation pushed the healthcare industry to use social media to its maximum potential. This is the current trend that is taking over the market. This also provided the doctors with a way to generate extra revenue and spread awareness at the same time. Ÿ Artificial Intelligence – Robotic Surgery Assistance

The list that you are following already includes one example that already works on Artificial Intelligence or AI. However, the industry experts expect that the inclusion of AI in the healthcare industry is going to be revolutionary.

Robotic Surgery is already picking up pace and becoming more popular in the healthcare industry. The robotic surgery does not actually operate on the patient, but it helps the doctor in operating at a better rate. Believe it or not, with the assistance of AI Robotic Surgery, narrow blood vessels from 0.03 to 0.08 mm can also be operated on with ease. Ÿ Virtual Reality

The doctors are providing such wonderful healthcare even though the technology restricts them at some steps. The 2D pictures X-rays are good, but the inclusion of monitors and 3D viewing of the body parts has provided the doctors with insights that could not be assessed easily. The healthcare industry demands the Virtual Reality industry to collaborate, help and enhance the healthcare industry.

For the future, VR in the healthcare industry is expected to grow more than $4 billion in the next few years. Though these are just predictions, the current situation resides with virtual nursing assistance.

Even though the above list does have future related technology in the list, it has already revolutionized the healthcare industry effectively. The technology has camouflaged so well with the healthcare industry that in the future, the separation of these two would be quite impossible. Though many technological advancements showcase the actual power of technology, they somewhere are inclined with the concepts mentioned from the above list.

22|September 2021|www.insightscare.com

-Ashlesh Khadse

Timur Ozekcin

Co-founder and CEO

Safeguarding What Matters Most for Healthcare Organizations

T

he healthcare industry is driven by patient care and medical devices and data that enable them. Modern healthcare organizations depend on a new generation of IoMT and connected devices and their capability and data that is used in treating patient conditions, prescribing medication, assessing treatment effectiveness, determining equipment needs to serve patient needs, and many other data-driven healthcare decisions.

Increased number of connected medical devices and the Internet of Medical Things (IoMT) delivers increased data and a great deal more in the lifecycle of patient care.

Connected medical devices and IoMT devices have contributed to improved patient care outcomes, workflow efficiencies, other bottom-line benefits for healthcare organizations.

However, these same devices also increase cyber risk exposure and a broader attack surface for threat actors. This translates into a greater risk, including security risks such as ransomware, legal, regulatory, inability to provide patient care, and more importantly, direct patient harm from devices that can be reached and altered by outsiders.

24|September 2021|www.insightscare.com

Top 10 Fastest-Growing Healthcare Tech Companies, 2021

Enter Cylera, a leader in IoT and medical device/IoMT security. The Cylera Platform, which is Cylera’s flagship product, provides the most leading-edge and patented technology available in healthcare IoT and delivers visibility, risk detection, and threat prevention for all connected assets to safeguard patient care, safety, privacy, and business continuity.

devices. Cylera can find, prioritize, and respond to security gaps that may relate to insulin pumps, CT and MRI scanners, ultrasound systems, etc., but never interact the physical devices themselves. This helps IT security teams to effectively assist in knowing security gaps in IoMT and securing those clinical devices where they couldn’t with the tools they have today.”

Winds of Change Cylera was co-founded by Timur Ozekcin, Sean Abraham, and Paul Bakoyiannis in 2017 in New York City with a mission to create the leading solution for healthcare organizations for securing their IoT, IoMT, and even operational technology (OT) such as building security, lighting, climate controls, elevators, and access points, etc.

“Many hospitals we’ve worked with are looking for our guidance on best practices and technology for their teams who are responsible for medical devices and cybersecurity” says Timur, CEO of Cylera.

“We help some start with fundamentals including the ability to provide an inventory of their IoT or IoMT, and what they should do to build a security program around IoMT to deal with the big area of unknown cyber risk.

There can be as many as 15-20 medical devices and IoMT per bed in most hospitals. This equipment operates using unique protocols and communications that are a common blind spot for IT security teams because their usual tools cannot give them the needed visibility or capability,” he adds.

Cylera’s healthcare cybersecurity platform can help hospitals with major functional requirements to reduce security risks for IoT and IoMT device security: asset identification and management, network analysis, risk assessment, threat detection and intelligence, network segmentation, operational analytics, and integrations.

The company’s technology is powered by patented AI and ML techniques. “Our patented technology delivers deeper knowledge about the devices and activities which inform needed understanding of clinical environments and workflows,” says the team at Cylera.

“Our patents also allow us to deliver zero-touch vulnerability assessment through an innovative IoT Emulation Engine™, which creates digital twins of the

Fig 1 - Cylera’s unique, patented capabilities work together to give customers details and what to do to shore up weaknesses – many of which can be risk-prioritized lower than initially expected.

“We provide device maintenance and usage information which ultimately saves costs through better fleet management and optimization. Also, our technology aligns with essential security frameworks and standards which speed compliance and keep organizations within regulatory requirements,” adds the team.

Setting Benchmarks of Innovation Cylera has many differentiators from others in the healthcare IoT cybersecurity space.

Following are a few: Ÿ

Ÿ

Ÿ

Patented Adaptive Datatype Analysis™ – A unique method within Cylera’s Deep Packet Inspection (DPI) engine, to constantly learn new devices and protocols which speeds device identification where others have to constantly build and release new protocol “dissectors.”

Patent-pending IoT Emulation – Requires zero-touch to live devices and creates a ‘digital twin’ of the physical equipment in use to diagnose weaknesses and vulnerabilities, keeping the device and patient safe.

Fleet Optimization – Cylera can analyze fleet utilization from healthcare IoT data and provide guidance for how to better optimize equipment, location, and revenue.

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Cylera's IoT cybersecurity platform is the foremost in leading edge IoT cybersecurity, with solutions and intelligence that hospitals need to safeguard patient care, safety, privacy, and business continuity.

• Device location – Identifies and guides to where devices are physically located within the environment, saving both clinical and IT personnel hours of time locating available or in-use devices.

• Cylera Intelligence Database – Cylera Labs™ has an intelligence database that can be subscribed to for proprietary and unique Cylera Labs research from both public and non-public sources globally.

• Extends one platform for use by both IT teams and clinical engineering – The technology can be used, viewed, and managed for IoT, OT, and IoMT all within the Cylera platform.

Cylera’s new technologies are beginning to garner notice, with several awards, but the most notable accolades have come quietly and out of the public eye due to the threat detection and threat hunting services underway in Cylera Labs.

“Our customers are the best barometer of our success, with quotes and praise for the innovative solutions we bring to bear through our patented technology and deep understanding of the healthcare and other IoT markets,” says the leadership team at Cylera.

In addition, Cylera’s customers express that they appreciate the innovations and strong support for any healthcare IoT challenges they are trying to address.

Exemplary Expertise At the helm of Cylera’s success are the three co-founders – who all come from a background in healthcare technology and cybersecurity. Ozekcin is the CEO, with Abraham managing operations as COO, and Bakoyiannis as CTO.

Ozekcin earned both a Bachelor of Science in Biological Engineering and a master’s degree in Mechanical Engineering at Cornell University. Before Cylera he was a project for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), as well as a previous leadership of a connected device company.

Through these experiences, the three co-founders saw the need and opportunity to bring stronger solutions to the healthcare IoT and IoMT cybersecurity challenge.

New Cybersecurity Dynamics with COVID-19 Impact With the technical and communication challenges around COVID-19, nation-state and attack groups accelerated targeting the World Health Organization (WHO), the U.S. Center for Disease Control (CDC), and regional healthcare and pharmaceutical networks globally in search of research data, intellectual property, protected health information, and monetary gain through ransomware.

We asked Ozekcin for his opinion on the effects of the current pandemic on the healthcare sector and what challenges did he and the co-founders faced during the initial phase of the pandemic. “Long prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, healthcare organizations have been targeted, largely by nation-states. Cylera’s product can ease this cybersecurity risk while safeguarding what matters most to healthcare professionals: better patient outcomes, safety, and privacy,” said Ozekcin.

“Like all businesses Cylera there was an impact of COVID19 on our business and our employees – however the need for our solution expanded due to increasing cybersecurity risk and the need to have Cylera’s unique automated capabilities. Quick deployment, reduced costs, increased security without touching assets or patients, alignment with regulatory requirements and support for business continuity have been high value capabilities. It has been unique time for Cylera and our customers,” Ozekcin adds.

The Future Looks Bright “Cylera is excited to build on its record growth during the last 6 months with both clients and expanded team with a world-class executive team. Cylera’s partner program has seen many new additions with new channels partners and technology alliances. “Following Cylera’s new round of funding which we announced in March 2021, said Ozekcin, “we are continuing to expand internationally in Europe and Asia.”

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Simplifying Healthcare Data Services

E

normous data is generated due to digitization in healthcare.

This data needs to be amassed on a single platform. More than ever before, now healthcare service providers need a common ground that gives them an overview of their patients, improves healthcare services, minimizes expenditure, and provides cost-effective care.

Gathering all the data, storing, and analyzing them, however, is not possible for healthcare service providers. Here is where data service providers come to the picture.

Healthcare data includes collecting, storing, managing, and transmitting patients’ electronic medical record, the hospital’s operational management and other information. With all the data under one roof, healthcare providers save time and energy that were otherwise utilized for gathering data from various channels. There are several healthcare data service companies that are helping healthcare establishments to integrate data and have an easy access to it.

Innovaccer Inc. is one such company that is contributing significantly to the healthcare service provider industry. It is a leading medical services data activation organization aiming to deliver more effective medical care using pioneering examination and

transparent, clean, and accurate information.

The company was recognized as Best HealthTech Startup in Entrepreneur India 2021, received Future Young Leader (Future Young Leader Organization) leadership award, and many more.

Ankit Maheshwari, who is the Founding Member, President, R&D, and India Operations at Innovaccer, shared his opinion and experiences about the health-tech industry in the following interview.

Please brief our audience about Innovaccer Inc., its mission, and the key aspects of its stronghold within the healthcare technology services niche.

Innovaccer Inc. is a leading San Francisco-based healthcare technology company committed to helping healthcare care as one. Our solutions have been deployed across more than 1,000 care settings in the U.S., enabling more than 37,000 providers to transform care delivery and work collaboratively with payers and life sciences companies.

We have helped organizations integrate medical records for more than 24 million people and generate more than $600 million in savings. Innovaccer is

recognized as a Best in KLAS vendor for 2021 in population health management and a No. 1 customerrated vendor by Black Book.

We envision connected healthcare working collaboratively to keep people healthy and well. Our mission is to connect and curate the world’s healthcare information to make it accessible and useful. With Innovaccer, everyone works in the service of patients like never before—as one.

Innovaccer stands for Innovation Accelerator, and we are the leading platform for connecting providers, payers, patients, and pharma so that everyone in healthcare can care as one.

The Innovaccer Health Cloud is the next big advancement in the pursuit of our mission. It unifies patient data across systems and settings and empowers healthcare organizations to rapidly develop scalable, modern applications that improve clinical, operational, and financial outcomes.

Tell us more about the offerings that give Innovaccer Inc. a distinctive edge to stand out from the competition?

What sets Innovaccer apart is that it was the first to deliver plug-and-play connectivity with pre-built connectors.

This feature ensures that the data analytics company's customers have

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Top 10 Fastest-Growing Healthcare Tech Companies, 2021

access to real-time, state-of-the-art analytics, which in turn puts Innovaccer ahead of its competition.

The Innovaccer Health Cloud provides a whole-person data model. The architecture enables partner apps and new solution development through its platform, which contains a separate Data activation platform, configurable application suites, and developer tool capabilities. The platform's entire design has been created, keeping all stakeholders in the care cycle in mind, and is, therefore, extremely user-friendly.

Ankit Maheshwari

Founding Member, President, R&D and India Operations, Innovaccer

About Ankit Maheshwari As a founding team member, Ankit Maheshwari has been an essential part of bringing the five-people-in-a-basement organization to the enterprise and unicorn it is today. He has been at the helm of Innovaccer’s Engineering vertical.

He has worked closely with the organization's clients and partners over the years to develop and deploy industryleading Data Activation Platform at more than 1000 healthcare practices across the globe.

He focused his energies on developing and executing strategies for accelerating growth and innovation. His unparalleled technical expertise, passion for coding, and commitment to development (shared by his team) made Innovaccer one of the fastest-growing SaaS-based companies globally.

In his cross-functional role, along with leading the entire Engineering and Product verticals, he also heads Innovaccer’s overall India Operations. He brings a unique strategic advantage while maintaining and solidifying the organization.

Ankit also represented Innovaccer at the White House (West Wing) for the 2019 Blue Button Developers Conference. The event explored how stakeholders can best leverage technology to unleash the next generation of healthcare innovation. He showcased the company’s expertise on how developers and healthcare organizations can leverage the Data Activation Platform to add value for providers, researchers, payers, and many more across various domains in healthcare.

We wanted to make using the solution a piece of cake for the people, and the platform is such that no one has to spend more than minutes trying to understand it. We have a dedicated clinical team of some of the world's most renowned clinicians assisting us in our end-user approach.

Tremendously reputed technology luminaries helm our engineering vertical, and we are committed to making our data activation platform extremely agile, fast, and secure.

To understand the core problems that the healthcare industry is subjected to, we have a one-of-a-kind strategic advisory council consisting of the world's most prestigious physician leaders, educationalists, technology wizards, entrepreneurs, and thought leaders. Our employees work in close collaboration with them to create the most relevant solutions that not just solve a problem but eliminate it on a grassroots level.

What is your opinion on the effects of the current pandemic on the healthcare sector, and what challenges did you face during the initial phase of the pandemic?

The pandemic has been nothing less than a World War, an irrepressible situation to navigate that has severely affected businesses and establishments across industries. COVID19 exposed our healthcare system’s weaknesses. We need a more robust technology backbone to support us. For example, organizations can use command centers to improve their operations, and providers can reach people using virtual (remote) visits for care and consultation, which is the future beyond today’s four walls of healthcare.

There were, of course, numerous challenges when the pandemic forced us all into a lockdown initially. The “work-from-home” system, although already in place at Innovaccer, was still new to most. Bringing the synergy from our open office layout to Zoom calls was a hurdle that

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EXHIBITING EXCELLENCE 2018 ● Forbes AI Companies To Know In Healthcare ● 25 Machine Learning Startups To Watch In 2018 - Forbes ● Best 'Healthcare Big Data Platform’ by MedTech

2019 ● Deloitte’s 2019 Technology Fast 500™ ● Forbes AI companies to know in healthcare in 2019 ● 25 Machine Learning Startups To Watch In 2019 - Forbes ● 'Best Healthcare Big Data Platform' in 2019 MedTech Breakthrough Awards

2020 ● #738 on the 2020 Inc. 5000 America's Fastest-Growing Private Companies List ● Top Emerging Healthcare IT Startups ● Fast 500 North America 2020 - Deloitte ● CB Insights Digital Health 150 ● Largest East Bay Tech Employers - San Francisco Business Times

2021 ● Best in KLAS vendor for Population Health Management 2021 ● #64 on the Inc. 5000 Regionals: California list ● Black Book #1 Customer-rated Data Activation Platforms and Healthcare Data Integration Systems ● One of 50 Best Data Science Firms to work for in India by Analytics India Magazine ● #22 in Largest Bay Area Digital Health Companies (San Francisco Business Times 2021) ● 50 Best Firms In India For Data Scientists To Work For (Analytics India Magazine) ● Inc. 5000 rank #871 - 2021

LEADERSHIP AWARDS ● Forbes 30 Under 30 Asia 2017: Enterprise Tech ● 35 under 35 Entrepreneurs in India in 2021 (Entrepreneur India) ● Rising Stars in Healthcare (Becker's Hospital Review) ● Founders to Look out for in 2016 (Economic Times) ● 40 under 40 Data Scientists (Analytics India Magazine 2020) ● 40 Under 40 Data Scientists Award (Analytics India Magazine 2021) ● Techpreneur Class of 2021 (Entrepreneur India 2021) ● 35 under 35 (Entrepreneur India 2021)

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took time to overcome. We depended significantly on technology for collaboration between teams.

The WFH burnouts could not be ignored, especially considering that various teams and members worked in four different time zones. Our Ministry of Fun (People Operations) stepped up to the challenge with several teambuilding exercises and game nights to give us all some respite from non-stop working. We did not give up on our cause during the pandemic. It became yet another reason for us to fight for our mission even harder.

With continuous development in technologies such as AI and big data, what is your prediction about the future of the healthcare software services market?

Healthcare is on the brink of a massive transformation. Over the last ten years, the industry has spent billions of dollars in digitizing healthcare information with great success. That was step #1 of the journey. Now, we have troves of information on our health locked in electronic silos. We need to bring this information together using a cloud platform that not only unlocks the power of the data but also provides a platform on which new digital services and solutions can be built with native interoperability.

Innovaccer provides the missing link in healthcare technology. Now more than ever, customers need a platform that allows them to obtain a 360-degree view of their patients, drive down unnecessary IT costs, and improve care quality and cost-effectiveness. With the launch of Innovaccer Health Cloud, we are building the platform that will power the future of health.

As an established leader, what would be your advice to the budding entrepreneurs and enthusiasts aspiring to venture into the healthcare software services niche?

The healthcare industry is a very diverse field. Each region across the globe has its problems and challenges when it comes to this sector, thereby requiring unique solutions in every new location. To create the perfect solutions for your customers, you must first understand their needs and then the root of the problem. Having a clinical team or an advisory board of medical personnel with several years of experience in that particular location would help profusely in this quest.

Another essential aspect is knowing the ideal environment that your systems would require to work perfectly. There will be times when you will have to fine-tune your solutions to suit the needs of your users, but for that, you need to comprehend the commitments of your system first. You should not aim for perfection but rather the ability to do quick iterations based on user feedback.

In addition to this, you should always remain on top of learning about the competitive landscape. Healthcare may be a diverse industry, but it is also a growing one. New solutions and products are cropping up every day, and you need to keep your offerings up-to-date and unique at all times to win here.

How do you envision scaling Innovaccer Inc. operations and offerings in 2021?

many in the context of healthcare. For instance, the foundation of companies like Spotify or Netflix is a powerful data storage and analytics machinery to provide a customized experience to its users. We believe that such a comprehensive data platform is still missing in healthcare, and we want to orchestrate the shift in that direction.

To begin with, we want to scale the 25 million patients currently on the Innovaccer Health Cloud platform to 1 billion globally. For this, we invest significantly in R&D and a 5X expansion of our go-to-market teams globally. Additionally, we want to open the platform for our partners to build on top of our capabilities.

Our solutions will cater to the needs of tomorrow and are already gaining sufficient traction. We aim to not only help healthcare organizations improve care quality and reduce operational costs but to also make lives easier for every individual in a care-delivery model.

The next big horizon is building an expanding ecosystem where partners and health-tech innovators can develop on top of our Health Cloud Platform, enabling more value to the users. For example, how do we bring in life sciences and pharma companies to do clinical trials on the same platform?

In the coming days, we will continue expanding our base and keep rolling out solutions and updates that genuinely address even the most minute challenges healthcare professionals face. We are also open to exploring new geographies, if and when we have a product-fit and relevant use-cases.

Data platforms are the future. Many companies are on the path, but not

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Digital Diagnosis

Is

telemedicine here

to stay?

T

he global COVID-19 pandemic has strongly influenced the shift in healthcare from mostly in-person to advanced predominant virtual care. Many healthcare providers have shifted the follow-up and chronic care to a virtual platform that fulfills the demand to free up hospital spaces for the consistently increasing COVID-19 patients.

This has resulted in controlling the spread of infection to a greater extent and the availability of consistent facilities for emergent patients. In addition to that, many specialist appointments are now being conducted virtually. As a result, telemedicine exploded in popularity as a response to maintain physical distancing.

Many healthcare providers have found an efficient tool with diverse advantages and strategies. Telemedicine was a growing trend, and it will continue to grow as the pandemic has forced it towards its forefront.

Telemedicine offers several advantages like: Enabling Convenience for Healthcare Providers and Patients Since the outbreak of the pandemic, it is becoming clear for both the patients and the healthcare providers that prescribing medicines, pharmaceutical consultancies, and chronic care appointments do not always require in-person visits.

Telemedicine allows convenience and reduced travel time, and most patients are willing to pay for these convenient services. These services allow the healthcare providers a smaller time commitment required from the patients.

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The healthcare providers were constantly looking for ways that could enhance patients’ experience. Telemedicine comes in as an excellent solution to attract patients and use it regularly in the treatment where appropriate.

Telemedicine services fit well with demand-driven care. An online appointment is more convenient to schedule for appropriate situations. It is a proven, cost-effective solution for both patients and providers as it allows frequent and long-term check-ins with alternative options. As a result, it increases the patients’ trust in healthcare providers.

Enhancing Capabilities Technology is still advancing, and the possibilities for the future of telemedicine are interminable. The constant advances in technology are influencing the revolution of the healthcare system. In diverse cases, telemedicine and its virtual care are efficient tools for healthcare providers.

As healthcare providers are experiencing an increase in convenience and cost-efficiency, healthcare providers are working with tech-oriented companies to enhance their services.

On the other hand, healthcare companies are expanding their solutions by utilizing services from well-established communication tools like video and audio calls to transformative technologies like artificial intelligence and machine learning.

Telemedicine tools are becoming more accepted and feasible for everyday use as they are incorporating features to obtain providers’ feedback and using it to adjust and improvements to improve providers’ experience and satisfaction.

Re-defining the Regulations When COVID-19 arose, many of the policies governing and concerning telemedicine have been slackened and continuously updated to accommodate the state of emergency.

These substantial changes brought an unexpected outcome of establishing the benefits of telemedicine by helping patients to continue their treatments with their doctors remotely without getting any of the risk factors involved in the process. As a result, many patients received top-notch medical services in the comfort of their homes.

As telemedicine is rapidly advancing, the regulations and policies are being constantly updated and are also being expanded to include innovative technologies. These factors are enabling new enhancements in the telemedicine platforms.

Healthcare at our Fingertips It is still a matter of concern that many rural parts of the world do not have easy access to healthcare services.

Patients have to travel for hours at times to receive adequate care as per their needs. Also, older people with chronic conditions are not able to visit their doctors more often because of the long-distance travel.

Telemedicine continues to significantly impact the frequency of providing quality healthcare services to patients living in rural areas. Additionally, these patients can connect with their specialist doctors and get their medical advice without any location constraints.

In any diagnosis, a patients’ medical history plays a crucial role in gathering information needed to rectify the problems and guide a precise treatment. Telemedicine allows the collection of this data remotely enabling convenience, as a patient is more relaxed and honest in a home setting.

As the technology is evolving, data collection from consumer technology like wearables is providing vital information about the living conditions by observing patients in their environment.

Telemedicine: Future of Healthcare?

Telemedicine is enabling convenience in the healthcare industry but, there are diversified treatments that require an in-person diagnosis.

However, now that the medical practices are experiencing the strengths of telemedicine, and as the healthcare industry evolves alongside technological developments, telemedicine is eventually becoming a significant part of the healthcare industry.

New healthcare providers in this niche are implementing telemedicine to stay ahead in the industry because telemedicine is here to stay.

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-Abhishek Joshi

Digital Health: Helping Hospitals Address

Patients’ Needs in a

Post-COVID World

through Innovative Solutions -David Boucher, MPH, FACHE, Chief of Service Excellence, Group/Corporate Level, Aster DM Healthcare Limited

D

uring the pandemic, hospitals worldwide dealt with surges in COVID-19, while many patients canceled elective procedures to avoid exposure and infections.

Although this trend freed up hospital capacity and equipment, it also drastically reduced patient volume, resulting in revenue declines. Amid the rising costs from taking care of COVID-19 patients, these issues are collectively causing significant financial damage to hospitals that will take years to fix.

However, the news isn’t all negative because many hospital administrators worked during this unwelcomed ‘downtime’ to improve their hospitals’ services. They have produced innovative solutions to help their hospitals address patients’ needs after a COVID-19 recovery and prevent the

challenges they faced during the pandemic.

For example, astute leaders increased and advanced their hospital’s digital health and advanced technologies, invested in essential infrastructure, and completed overdue renovations, where supply chains allowed. They also improved their procurement practices to increase these supply chains, especially for personal protection equipment (PPE), in the event of another healthcare crisis.

Digital Health Goes Mainstream During COVID COVID-19 forced leadership teams to realize that every healthcare business relies heavily upon digital capabilities, making it essential to digitizing operations and patient engagement as

much as possible. A new report said 93% of healthcare executives reported that COVID-19 drove health IT innovations and showed that organizations needed digital health for “business resiliency.” Then another 81% said they were accelerating the pace of digital transformation in their organizations.

Like never before, business and technologies strategies are intertwined in healthcare compared to previous timeframes where IT was just a part of healthcare business strategy.

Digital health offers real opportunities to improve care delivery patient outcomes, enhance efficiency and reduce costs.

As hospitals face challenges to address patients’ needs for COVID-19 recovery and beyond, they recognize the critical

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role of digital health technologies and innovative solutions. Digital solutions are the impetus for transforming healthcare access and care delivery, making care more affordable, convenient, and personalized for individuals wherever they are located.

Many organizations are undergoing digital transformation to introduce

‘smart’ infrastructure through extensive use of emergent technologies, including telemedicine, remote patient monitoring, artificial intelligence (AI), data analytics, and the Internet of Things (IoT).

AI is one key area where health IT executives are integrating digital health solutions into their organizations. In

the future, AI will help to predict a patient’s risk of certain diseases and suggest preventive treatments and measures. AI will also reduce waiting times for patients and improve efficiency in hospitals and health systems, among many other developments to improve care delivery and patient outcomes.

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Looking beyond the pandemic, hospitals will become even more consumer-centric, and clinicians will be empowered with solutions that reach out to meet patients at home via digital means. Despite its benefits, hospitals will need to be aware of the challenges of health tech, including privacy, safety, security, cost, and more.

Telehealth Benefits for Improving Patient Care and Outcomes The ability to maintain a continuity of care whenever possible is one of the telehealth’s main benefits. Telehealth helps patients access primary care providers and specialists, including mental and behavioral health, manage their chronic health conditions and medications, assist with follow-up care after treatment and help with many other aspects of care.

Telehealth became more widely adopted during the pandemic to expand access to essential health services. It helped reduce staff exposure to COVID-19, avoid surges in healthcare facilities and save critical resources like PPE. Additionally, there were reduced barriers to telehealth access, and providers were able to deliver acute, chronic, primary, and specialty care while improving patient health outcomes.

Many believe that the next ten years may prove to be the decade when digital technology will reshape the health system, as continued strong uptake, favorable consumer perception, and tangible investment in this space contribute to the continued growth of telehealth and digital solutions in 2021.

In fact, a new analysis indicates telehealth use has increased 38X from the pre-COVID-19 baseline.

Other Services and Innovations to Improve Patient Needs Hospitals are under pressure to become more patient-centered as patients want and expect an enhanced service experience that allows them greater participation in their healthcare journey. Medical groups and physician practices join their hospital colleagues to drive improvement efforts by using digital technologies to address patient needs and concerns.

One area where digital technologies are particularly valuable in dealing with critical staff shortages and refocusing efforts to direct patient care.

For example, there is a tablet application that can help nurses take better care of their patients and not consume their time with non-medical requests. The app sends requests to dietary, maintenance, and other staff to assist patients and make them more comfortable during their hospital stay without overwhelming nursing staff.

Enhancing the patient experience is another important area where hospitals are borrowing from hotel and hospitality models to drive improved satisfaction, better care delivery, and outcomes while ensuring financial stability and keeping costs down. They are measuring and comparing benchmarks along the whole patient journey with online, real-time dashboards using emails, QR (Quick Response) codes, and more to ask for patient feedback and then listen and respond to comments and concerns.

Patients can respond in any clinic or hospital setting, including the bedside, with their smartphones. It’s essential to respond to issues in a timely manner with the proper follow-up to make things right for the patient. Staff needs

to be constantly reminded that it’s not “the big that ate the small, it’s the fast that ate the slow.”

There are many clinical cases for improving the patient experience. For example, diabetic patients demonstrate greater self-management skills and quality of life when they report positive interactions with their providers. Other patients with better communication with their providers are more likely to adhere to medical advice and treatment plans. Studies of patients hospitalized for heart attack showed that those with a positive patient experience had better health outcomes one year following discharge.

However, these extensive services and innovations require a culture of improvement that begins with a staff willing to implement the changes. It begins with a human resources department hiring people who want to participate on a whole journey of improvement for all, especially the patient.

In addition, efforts to improve patient experience have been shown to result in greater employee satisfaction, which reduces turnover and creates a positive work culture. However, improving the experience of patients and their families requires improving a host of work processes and systems that enable clinicians and staff to provide more effective care.

These service and innovation changes take extensive support, dedication, time, and investment. But the longterm benefit to hospitals is priceless and will also help make them stronger in the face of any future health crises.

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Disrupting the Telehealth Space with Innovative Technology

T

elehealth platforms have progressed immensely during the COVID-19 pandemic, given the urgent need for people to maintain social distancing for containing the deadly coronavirus.

These platforms helped the outpatients and healthcare professionals to effectively receive and provide services, while also containing the virus.

Medefer Ltd. is one of the leading players in the telehealth space, relentlessly delivering comprehensive solutions throughout the healthcare industry. The company is spearheaded

by Dr Bahman Nedjat-Shokouhi, the CEO and Founder of Medefer Ltd.

In the following, Dr Nedjat-Shokouhi elaborates on how Medefer is successfully driving the virtual healthcare space to new zeniths through patient-centred service approach.

Below are the highlights from the interview:

financial, environmental, and clinical sustainability.

Our technology enables small pockets of time available to a large hi body of u o highly talented GMC registered NHS k hoaggregated, der together n S Consultantsato be u j t nd Fo eadsignificant to make difference/impact a N n Ccare.

EO We mimic the Trusts a Our vision at Medefer, is to be the to patient hm world’s most patient-focused virtualr Ba processes, allowing real time metrics D healthcare service. We are on a mission and monitoring. The granular level of to help patients get better faster, by data captured around the way the partnering with the NHS to build the human interface works allows our data best unparalleled outpatient processes to inform the improvements in that provide patients with quicker pathways and supporting technology. access to care.

Medefer’s service has never been Our virtual outpatient pathway blends timelier than in the recovery and clinical expertise with a technology sustainability of the NHS by ensuring platform to enable a flexible NHS that each patient receives personalised Consultant body, to radically improve care. the flow and speed in which outpatient care is delivered, transforming the Patient-first: We are driven to deliver patient experience. Medefer supports an unrivalled healthcare experience for the NHS immediate pandemic recovery every patient. plans but also a long-term route to

Please brief our audience about Medefer, its mission, and the key aspects of its stronghold within the healthcare technology services niche.

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Top 10 Fastest-Growing Healthcare Tech Companies, 2021

Collaborative: We are deeply committed to working in partnership for the benefit of all.

Inventive: We challenge conventional thinking and continuously improve our solutions.

Here’s a list of Medefer’s awards and recognitions: UCL Advances (2014), Seedcamp (2014), Pioneer 500 (2016), DigitalHealth.London (2017), General Practice Awards (2017), CEO Today Healthcare Awards (Winner 2018)), Selected top 10 UK Healthtech in June.

Tell us more about the offerings that give Medefer a distinctive edge to stand out from the competition?

There are so many interconnections in the world today, high performing people and systems all need to find the way to harness small incremental marginal gains, and that’s how Medefer is successful. With our consultants able to deliver up to 72% of your outpatient capacity (dependant on speciality) virtually, this leaves NHS teams to focus on those patients who really require face to face care; cancer and complex cases; interventional and surgical procedures.

We strive to improve outcomes for patients and clinicians, and in most cases from the point a GP colleague makes a referral, we have it reviewed and back to them for next steps within just 48 hours, creating a truly patientfocused health system. For patients it means they receive faster care but also, we significantly reduce their need to physically enter the hospital.

Our conception was driven to solve a very real problem with our own technology platform, and as a result we are at the forefront of innovation in

outpatient services. We cover Trusts and Integrated Care Systems who have backlog and workforce recruitment issues, but the long-term goal of our services delivers innovation in the transformation of health and care.

What is your opinion on the effects of the current pandemic on the healthcare sector, and what challenges did you face during the initial phase of the pandemic?

COVID-19 forced a paradigm shift in healthcare globally – forcing health systems to change not just the modalities of interacting with patients but also to review long established clinical pathways and protocols.

As a provider of outpatient elective care, Medefer lost access to most complex investigations almost overnight. We had to adapt our clinical pathways to assess patients to ensure that those who were most at risk of harm were prioritised for access to limited elective investigation.

During COVID-19 the population has become more familiar with virtual pathways such as Medefer’s, opening up a wider range of patients that can be cared for in virtual clinic. Medefer has been utilising asynchronous technology enabled patient assessment for several years and was uniquely placed to provide significant capacity for patient assessment to Trusts and other healthcare systems struggling with back logs due to COVID-19.

The greatest opportunity in the digitalisation of patient care during COVID-19 has been the opportunity to drastically review the way in which patients are assessed, diagnosed, and treated. The tech enabled outpatient service helps patients achieve speedier reassurance, diagnosis, and treatment.

COVID-19 has catalysed a decade’s

worth of acceptance of change in the space of 18 months.

With continuous development in technologies such as AI and big data, what is your prediction about the future of the healthcare software services market?

There are two areas that big data will impact: advent of personalised care as more personal data can be analysed that will improve the clinical decision making for that patient, and improvements in operational delivery to reduce waste. In terms of personalised care, this will span across pre-emptive care, to chronic disease management. Another area of improvement in clinical care is the delivery of safer care, with the ability of the software to prompt the clinicians about possible treatments or risks.

With regards to operational delivery, predictive models will help healthcare organisations to optimise their operations, whilst on a larger population basis such predictive models will enable healthcare commissioners to predict changes to demand.

As an established leader, what would be your advice to the budding entrepreneurs and enthusiasts aspiring to venture into the healthcare software services niche?

It is critical to build the appropriate team with the correct mentality for a start-up and the skills needed to build a product in the highly specialised and emotive field of Healthcare. This is regardless of whether the software is designed to be used by patients, clinicians, or management.

Furthermore, healthcare is highly regulated, and due to software technology advances the regulatory

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landscape is evolving rapidly and in certain areas has not completely caught up. Therefore, the Minimum Viable Product will need to be more polished and functional than it would need to be in another field that is not as specialised and regulated as healthcare.

How do you envision on scaling Medefer’s operations and offerings in 2021?

The COVID pandemic has resulted in historically high waiting lists for outpatient services. The model of outpatient service delivery had not changed for 70 years, but the COVID

Medefer’s service has never been timelier than in the recovery & sustainability of the NHS by ensuring that each patient receives personalised care.

pandemic has meant that hospitals and patients are more comfortable with virtual services. At Medefer, we have a track record of exemplary clinical safety for delivering specialist care virtually.

During 2021, we have been expanding the range of clinical specialties we offer and expanding our reach geographically to help as many hospitals as we possibly can. We have also been spending heavily on research and development to improve our platform and offer new and innovative services to the patients.

About the Leader Neuroscientist, molecular biologist, and consultant gastroenterologist, Dr Bahman Nedjat-Shokouhi is the CEO and founder of Medefer in his own words, “I entered medicine, passionate about dedicating my life to better patient outcomes through scientific research. I didn’t intend to get into business, but it all started when I met a lady who had anxiously waited 11 weeks for a hospital review of her liver tests which turned out to be normal.

I decided to create the infrastructure to address issues like this, which can cause anxiety but also worsen clinical outcomes. That’s when I became excited about my ability to make a difference to patients’ lives by affecting change through the application of technology, and the way we as professionals interact with our workload to make a difference to patients’ lives at a very personal level.

I created an infrastructure that enables specialists to manage patients safely, effectively, reducing waiting times and risk of harm, whilst leveraging the knowledge in data we collect that’s lost in the traditional models of care.”

A natural entrepreneur, even as a junior doctor, just as the NHS was beginning to implement electronic systems, Bahman became aware of many inefficiencies within A&E, so he negotiated funding from the hospital, worked with a developer, and created a new programme that transformed the way patients were managed. It’s this innovative mind, dedication to patient care coupled with self-belief which has propelled Medefer to achieve the significant impact it does today.

42|September 2021|www.insightscare.com