How IoT Can Significanlty Improve Healthcare in the Context of Smart City
The ultimate goal of Smart City healthcare is
to increase quality and reach, while making
it more affordable. The Internet of Things
(IoT) powered by Digital 5 forces (i.e.
Mobility, Big Data, Cloud, Social and
Robotics & Artificial Intelligence (AI)), is
transforming these challenges into
opportunities. As per Frost & Sullivan,
Smart City healthcare is anticipated to
create business opportunities with a market
value of $220 Billion by 2020 2 .
I NTRODUCTION
Smart cities are parameterized based on
several evaluation criteria(s), which differs
across global agencies. ISO being one such
global agency enacted ISO 37120 Smart City
standard, which defines a common
performance yardstick for cities. Healthcare
is one key Smart City criteria, identified
under this standard, with 7 healthcare
indicators such as Number of In-patient
hospital beds, Physicians, Nursing personnel
per 100,000 population, Average life
expectancy, Under age 5 mortality per 1K
births, Suicide rate per 100K population and
Mental health practitioners per 100K
population 1 . For our discussion, we would
focus on first three indicators.
This paper focuses on addressing these
three challenges by leveraging digital
technologies best suited for different
scenarios, enabling a city’s administration
to increase their healthcare ratings and
strengthen their bid to be acknowledged as
a Smart City.
Similarly, as per International
Telecommunications Union (ITU), Usage
rate of electronic medical records and
Sharing rate of resource and information
among hospitals are recognized as key
crit eria for Smart City health. In the current
landscape, majorly there are three major
challenges in achieving Smart City
healthcare targets:
C HALLENGES
Below are some key challenges, which the
healthcare industry is currently facing:
o Year over Year increase in healthcare
infrastructure cost – In order to improve
the healthcare services, Smart City
administrations have been spending
significantly in associated infrastructure
(i.e., number of beds, medical
equipment, etc.). For a developing
nation like India, supporting a fifth of
world population, the growth in average
hospitalization costs annually is over
10% 3 . This burden is being passed on to
patients and payers. A major chunk of
hospital beds are occupied by patients
1. Continuous year over year increases in
healthcare cost,
2. The widening gap between required and
available medical workforce, and
3. The lack of capabilities to share centrally
available clinical data in real time.
1 http://smartcitiescouncil.com/article/dissecting-iso-37120-how-healthy-your-city-and-what-zip-codes-have-do-it
2
http://www.egr.msu.edu/~aesc310-web/resources/SmartCities/Smart%20City%20Market%20Report%202.pdf
3http://www.livemint.com/Opinion/DSH1OnDr2LG0zAcHhl29XJ/The-growing-burden-of-healthcare-costs.html
IIC Journal of Innovation
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