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FUTURE

Digital Health

The Future of Healthcare and the Pharmaceutical Industry

Ray Hammond is Europe’s most devices become more capable (providing Getting data about how effective a drug
experienced and most widely blood pressure monitoring, blood-glucose is during stressful activity, while sleeping,
published futurologist. For over 30 measurements, etc.), a growing proportion on very hot days, cold days, etc. will
years he has researched, written of patients with chronic conditions are also provide doctors with far better insight into
and spoken about how future likely to start wearing digital technology to a condition (and the efficacy of treatment)
trends will affect society and monitor their health on a daily basis. than has been available before, and will
business. provide drug companies with the opportunity
It is this “monitoring movement” – a fashion for real-time feedback about drug
Healthcare is about to undergo for self-measurement identified as the effectiveness, side effects and other factors
severe and radical disruption “quantified self ” movement in the USA – whilst patients are living in the “real world”.
caused by digital technology. that will provide the stream of data that will
This disruption will also change transform healthcare. In time, wearable digital health technology
profoundly the way the pharmaceutical will provide drug manufacturers with “real-
industry operates. Ambulatory health data (data about a time, real-world” clinical trials of their
patient’s vital signs collected 24/7 during products. This opportunity has never
Digital Health is about to become a central normal daily activities) has always been previously existed.
topic in all of our lives. As Steve Jobs said regarded as the “Holy Grail” of health
in 2011: “The convergence of technology data. Monitoring a patient’s response to The key question is; what percentage of the
and biology will be the biggest innovation of a particular drug whilst he or she is lying healthy (and less healthy) population will be
the twenty-first century”. in a hospital bed or sitting in a doctor’s motivated to monitor their health and fitness
consulting room is not nearly as useful as using wearable digital health technology?
Digital technology is already disrupting monitoring vital signs as a patient goes
major business, industry and professional about daily life. At present, this is likely to be a small
sectors such as retail, travel, the hotel percentage – perhaps less than 15 per cent.
trade, taxis, banking, legal services, etc. But, as the price of wearable
Now it is the turn of medicine – and this will monitors drops, and as the devices become
be a long-lasting and profound change. more stylish, this percentage is likely to
grow. I estimate that by 2030 half the
The central driver of this change is wearable population of the developed world will be
digital technology – devices which will using some sort of digital body monitoring
monitor, record and wirelessly stream data technology. The information streaming back
from consumers to their doctors, to hospitals from these billions of “smart, digital bodies”
and to pharmaceutical companies. will change the way doctors and healthcare
professionals interact with patients and will
Today, most wearable health technology transform the methods used to conduct
is focussed on fitness (Fitbit, etc.) but, clinical drug trials. n
as smart watches and other wearable

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