David McKeering, Partner, PwC South

David McKeering, Partner, PwC South East Asia Consulting, said that digital healthcare can dramatically improve an organisation’s productivity and, in turn, provide benefits in terms of both patient outcomes and the bottom line.
“If costs can be made affordable, digital health could be an answer to challenges faced by emerging markets to achieve sustainable growth and leapfrog developed nations to provide quality, affordable, universal, and patient-centric care,” he said.
In the US, traditional EHR implementation costs for hospitals can be as high as US$14,500 per bed with annual operating costs of US$2,700 per bed.
Inroads have already been made in some emerging markets. For example, the Philippines has implemented the Community Health Information Tracking System (CHITS), an open-source electronic medical records system for government health facilities. The Philippines and Malaysia are both moving toward cloud healthcare systems for both public and private hospitals.
“The benefits of digital healthcare can be felt beyond patients,” said David Wijeratne, PwC Growth Markets Centre Leader.
“By assisting the prevention of illness and supporting the provision of care through alternative locations such as clinics, fewer new doctors and nurses will need to be trained and fewer additional beds and hospitals created. This can help to reduce the overall financial healthcare burden on governments in emerging markets, enabling them to fund other key areas of the economy,” said Wijeratne.