The Life Sciences and Healthcare Industry is expected to grow exponentially in India. Federal and State governments across the globe are pushing the pedal on transformational initiatives to achieve these challenging goals. Launch of National Heath Protection Scheme and the intent to establish 150,000 wellness centres under the Ayushman Bharat Yojana, is a major step by the Indian Government towards achieving the UHC goals, presenting major growth opportunities for all the players in Life Sciences & Healthcare Industry.

LHIF – Lifesciences & Healthcare Innovation Forum (pronounced as LIFE) is a first-of-its-kind initiative by NASSCOM Center of Excellence – IoT, to provide a collaborative platform for members to explore and adopt innovation into their organizations.

LHIF was formally inaugurated on 19th Jun 2018 at the NASSCOM Start-up Warehouse in Bangalore in the gracious presence of a host of leaders from a cross section of the industry which included Industry Associations, Government, Academia, Health Insurers, Hospitals, Pharma, Technology, Start-ups and Venture Capitalists.

 


Collaborative Innovation is the key to success

Inaugurating the workshop, Mr. Sanjeev Malhotra, emphasised the need for collaborative innovation, which delivers desired results in the chosen industry.  “Healthcare in one of the top priority sector for NASSCOM and CoE is continuously engaging with the innovation eco-system around this sector. Organizations associated with CoE are able to leverage this    eco-system for faster adoption of technology for internal as well as societal benefits” stated Mr.Sanjeev.

 

An innovation platform, where the ‘Rubber is made to hit the Road

Mr.Raghuram gave an overview of CoE services offering and explained the intent behind initiating LHIF. LHIF is a platform which brings together the leaders from Pharma, Hospitals, Medical Tech industry, Government, Academia, Health Insurance companies, Technology Companies and the Start-ups, on a common platform with a single most focus of aiding use of technology to provide affordable and accessible healthcare to the public. It is a platform where experiences are shared within the peer group, discussions are carried out on policy matters, new delivery models are deliberated, and innovative solutions are showcased.

As per Mr. Raghuram “LHIF is a market place where deep-tech innovations in Lifesciences and Healthcare space are show-cased. It is a forum where the innovators and industry come together to explore the possibilities of faster adoption of technology for affordable and quality healthcare for better outcomes”.

 

Quality of data capture into EHR/EMR can be significantly improved by using IoT.

Delivering a special session on ‘Implementation of EHR/EMR – Leveraging IoT & AI’ Mr.Sunder Gaur noted that the availability of healthcare data for better patient insights and personalized care, is going to grow exponentially. As per him“IoT Technologies will play a significant role in speed and quality of data capture intoEHR/EMR. Using AI/ML can help take smarter decision based on this data.”

 

Deep-Tech innovations in healthcare is witnessing a never-seen-before rush across the Industry

Healthcare delivery is witnessing a surge in innovative products/solutions, riding on the technological advances in the industry. Use of IoT devices such as mobiles, sensors, cameras and robots coupled with Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning capabilities, the innovators are able to create a wide-range of products and solutions for improving the healthcare delivery. Digital diagnostics/screening capabilities, Remote Patient care, collaborative healthcare platforms etc. are helping the care professionals to expand their reach to the remote locations and enabling them to focuss more on preventive health and precision medicine.

A panel discussion was held during the LHIF workshop to understand the “Technology Trends in Healthcare Industry – Challenges & Opportunities”. An elite group of panellists deliberated on this topic providing their valuable insights to the audience. The Panel was moderated by Ms. Annie Mathew, Senior Director, Microsoft, and other panellists include: Mr. Rama Chandra Dash, Business unit Head, IBM Watson Health, Dr. Arvind Kasaragod, Director of medical Services, Cloudnine Hospitals, Mr. Jai Prakash Dwivedi, CIO, Rajiv Gandhi Cancer Institute & Research Center, Dr. Geetha Manjunath, CEO, Niramai Health Analytix.

Panel Discussion on “Technology Trends in Healthcare Industry – Challenges & Opportunities”

 

As per Ms.Annie Mathew “Technology is empowering the Healthcare Professionals to take informed decisions”. “The healthcare institutions are predominantly adapting technologies that are patient centric”, Dr. Arvind Kasaragod observed. “The use of AI in the operational and management side of hospitals have been around for some time, but the use of AI in the clinical side is still evolving” said Dr. Geetha Manjunath. From the perspective of Mr. Rama Chandra Dash, “use ofAIespecially in Oncology is empowering doctors to provide evidence-based care by understanding millions of data points and explore appropriate treatment options”. As per Mr.Jai Prakash Dwivedi “Healthcare CIOs are building their solutions from bottom up to lay strong technology foundation, at the same time they are looking out for niche innovative solutions for specific business needs”. All the panellists were univocal in forecasting that AI is going to play a pivotal role in healthcare delivery. However the challenge lies in interoperability of data exchange across multiple products and solutions.

 

How Artificial Intelligence is helping early detection of sugar levels

Mr. Abhishek Appaji is a graduate from Class 5 Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Global Entrepreneurship Bootcamp and founded Glukotek. Glucotek Inc focuses on developing a non-invasive continuous monitoring device in the form of a wearable earring and enables better control of diabetes by using AI technology which helps in calculation of calories based on food intake and predicts the sugar level. This helps the subject to take precautionary measures.

 

 

 

Technology adoption is the fastest route for bridging the demand supply gap in healthcare delivery, in the context of Ayushman Bharat Yojana.

Launch of National Health Protection Scheme and intent to create 150,000 wellness centres across the country, throws open a huge opportunity for the healthcare industry in India. A program of this magnitude will also come with some teething problems. A panel discussion on “Gearing up for the National Health Protection Scheme – Industry Perspective” was held during the LHIF workshop to understand the pulse of the industry. Eminent personalities from the healthcare industry were chosen to deliberate on this topic and provide their perspective.

The session was moderated by Mr. Sunder Gaur, Joint Director, CDAC and panellists include Dr.Alexander Thomas, Founder Member & President, Association of Healthcare Providers of India – AHPI, Dr. Chandrika Kambam, VP – Clinical Services Columbia Asia and Mr. Ishaq Quadri, Secretary, Healthcare Information and Management  Systems Society.

Panel Discussion on “Gearing up for the National Health Protection Scheme – Industry Perspective”

Opening the panel discussion, Mr.Sunder Gaur stated “Government is unplugging all possible resources and providing all required assistance from the entire government machinery to make NHPS a grand success”. While the industry bodies are cautious and unsure of the public private partnership references under this policy, the clarity will be visible gradually after we move into the implementation phase. As per Dr.Alexander Thomas “Success of the NHPS depends on how well the staff at Government Healthcare eco-system are educated about the policy implementation at operational level. Role of charitable hospitals may need to be adequately laid out in the policy”.  Speaking about the impact on Private Hospitals Dr.ChandrikaKambam was very vocal on the cost effectiveness to package prices for certain complex procedures. As per her, “The price points for some of the procedures are not viable for most of the private hospitals in the urban setting. Government should provide some incentives to the private players based on set parameters of performance.”  Deliberating on the topic Mr. Ishaq Quadri observed “while there are broad guidelines around the insurance side of the NHPS, the policy need to provide more clarity on coverage of the pre-hospitalization consultation and screening expenses”.

The interactionsbetween the audience and the panel, have brought out some important aspects like “While the experts are univocal about the need for increased role of Technology in bridging the wide gap between demand and supply in healthcare delivery, there are still major apprehensions amongst the public and more so in the healthcare professionals.”  Private healthcare providers will be compelled to find new delivery models to find a fine balance between the business opportunities through volumes vs. pressures on pricing structures. Government should also focus on pre-screening of population for early detection and preventive healthcare.”

Through the workshop duration, the industry representatives interacted with a select list of start-ups and learnt about the new innovations in the healthcare domain.

 

                   

                   

 

Participant Organizations

 

Industry Associations        :    AHPI, IEEE, HIT, INDIAN HEALTH ORGANIZATION, FHPL, HIMSS

Government                      :    CDAC

Health Insurance               :    Legato Technology (A captive of Anthem Group)

Hospitals                            :    Cloudnine Hospitals, St Johns National Academy of Health Sciences, Columbia Asia, H.C.G hospitals, Apollo Healthcity, Narayana Nethralaya, Rajiv Gandhi Cancer Institute & Research Centre Delhi

Media House                     :    IndiaMedToday

Academia                          :    BMS College of Engineering

Pharma                             :    Baxter, Merck

Technology                        :    IBM, Microsoft, Google, SAP, Aricent, L&T

Venture Capital                 :    Axilor Ventures

Start-ups                           :    Docon, Onward Health, Jana Med Tech., Nemocare Wellness, ChikitsakLifeSciences Pvt Ltd., MedIoTek Health Systems, Jana Med Tech., Asthrasoft, Medstrategist, QuikDr, RIJUVEN Corp, ChikitsakLifeSciences, Embtech Innova, Aakash Healthcare, lifespring.in, PregBuddy Connected Care, InnovatioCuris, VitaCloud Digital Health, Doux Dentistry, Quality Care.

#healthcare #LHIF #nasscomlhif #lhifnasscom #medtech #lifesciences #iot #nasscomcoeiot #nasscomcoeiotlhif #innovation #cocreate #india #NASSCOMHEALTH

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