Digital adoption is no longer a need but a much-awaited 'priority' in healthcare

Shahid Akhter, editor, ETHealthworld, in conversations with Sayak Das, Chief Brand and Innovation officer, Airo Digital Labs

Traditionally, healthcare, pharma, biotech were lagging digitally. They have never been the leaders because of the regulatory environment they work in. It’s not very easy to adopt new technologies. Digital workforce is not a threat to the human workforce, is actually going to augment the human workforce.

Shahid Akhter, editor, ETHealthworld, spoke to Sayak Das, Chief Brand and Innovation officer, Airo Digital Labs, to know more about the lingering challenges in adoption of digital technology in healthcare.

Digital India in healthcare
Globally I would say, earlier priorities, were much different. Two years back people were thinking of digital implementation or digital intervention more as a cost optimization option or being more productive or improving their efficiency. But post covid, what we have seen is that customer retention being more resilient, figuring out new revenue channels, these are of a higher priority today compared to just a cost optimization perspective. So organizations, across the globe and specifically in India, we have tested it out in covid vaccination rollout, how to be more regulatory compliant, how to reach out to people, how to manage these huge 1.3 billion people to get vaccinated, so managing those logistics perspective and other details. This is where the journey started; I would say for at least the next 4 to 5 years, we would see more adoptions of digital in these particular segments. Traditionally, healthcare, pharma, biotech -they are lagging digitally. They have never been the leaders because of the regulatory environment they work in. It’s not very easy to adopt new technologies.