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Healthcare | Technology

Opting In to Innovate Health

9 Feb 2018, by Francesca Brewer

Welcome to our Insights pages for INNOVATE HEALTH! As we launch this exciting event, we’re keen to offer this as a platform for featuring speaker profiles, discussing new research and industry reports, showcasing the latest and greatest innovations and giving voice to key questions and concerns among the industry.

This is certainly a big year for Australians as we begin exploring how technology can impact healthcare. As part of the 2017-18 Budget, the Australian Government announced the My Health Record system would transition to opt-out participation instead of the “opt in”. This means that (theoretically) by the end of 2018, every Australian will have a My Health Record, unless they choose not to have one.

With everyone now having a digital health record, patients and doctors alike should now be able to put in and pull out information on their health.  In the long term, there is also hope that this will pave the way for greater innovation around this new capability.

And what exciting innovations there are already! Even just the last few weeks as we have begun early preparation for the INNOVATE HEALTH programme and what I’ve read and heard is super exciting. I’ve spoken to an inspiring Aussie startup who have launched successfully in the US – an app that helps anyone diagnosed with cancer navigate through each stage of their cancer journey. With my own Dad this year diagnosed with cancer, this really resonated with me and I immediately forwarded details of the app on to my technically challenged father.

I’ve also read about startups who gamify medication taking, emerging use cases for robotics in socially assistive settings and the use of machine learning in clinical practice.

This week, the front cover of The Economist featured an article which was focused on “Doctor You” and how data will transform healthcare.  From better diagnosis, to management of chronic illness and artificial intelligence to identify cancerous tissue – it seems the possibilities are endless on how we use digital innovations to transform healthcare.

However, the road is not all paved with gold, there are of course challenges and reasonable concerns about the too-swift take-up of emerging technologies. Effective regulation, transparency, safety and privacy are just some of the words that come to mind.

Importantly, it is critical that we don’t get so caught up in the “cool stuff” that we neglect to build innovative products that actually help patients and clinicians. Innovators must be careful not to build solutions which are looking for a problem.

This is where greater communication and collaboration becomes paramount. Clinicians and innovators need to engage early and often as well as bringing in the necessary industry partners, regulators and investors at the appropriate time.

So that’s where we come in! INNOVATE HEALTH will bring together clinicians & healthcare professionals, startups & entrepreneurs, health tech specialists, innovation leaders, government stakeholders, regulators and business leaders for thought leadership, networking and productive discussion. It will showcase emerging digital technologies for the health industry, encourage meaningful engagement and collaboration, explore crucial go-to-market steps and learn from digital health success stories.

We hope you will join us at the event for the first time this year! Stay tuned for more from us!

Follow our updates on the event at #innov8health or to find out more visit https://www.informa.com.au/event/innovate-health-conference/

 

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