India 
USA 
Prof. Jaya Prakash and Prof. Ambedkar Dukkipati shared the details of IISc and TalentSprint’s Programme in Digital Health and discussed how this unique programme can help professionals and entrepreneurs build relevant expertise to shape their careers in the rapidly growing Digital Health market.
Digital Health is emerging as a strong area of technology adoption and impact. The last two years have created a big impetus in this space.
- According to McKinsey, as of 2019, Digital Health represented a global market of approximately $350 billion. Here, 49 percent of the Digital Health companies were in the care-delivery category (like effective therapies, providing remote patient support, or supplying therapies to patients) – making about a $157 billion market (as of 2019).
- The IMARC Group also saw robust growth here since 2015 and expects the market to grow at a CAGR of around 13 percent during 2021-2026.
- The global Digital Health market size – as reckoned by Precedence Research – was spotted at $181.8 billion in 2020.
- Statista predicts the Digital Health market to reach nearly $660 Billion by 2025.
Such a staggering growth and size of the market will create massive opportunities for professionals and entrepreneurs with relevant expertise.
So, what is Digital Health?
Healthcare is rapidly shifting towards innovative care delivery models, such as virtual, remote, and alternate care. In addition, the deployment of AI, advanced data analytics, IoT, and other emerging technologies and data-driven tools are changing healthcare solutions and delivery systems. Digital Health is the use of technology processes, tools, and services to facilitate better healthcare services. We have witnessed it as Electronic Health Record (EHR), Electronic Medical Record (EMR), Wearables, etc. It is visible in ways that iron out barriers in the smooth functioning of healthcare processes. This space is also witnessing the integration of artificial intelligence, machine learning, big data, and analytics platforms. Using on-demand technologies, Cloud, and advanced storage also strengthens the scale and affordability of Digital Health.
Building Digital Health capabilities
Digital Health is rapidly advancing in specific health applications like patient-apps, telehealth, medical wearables, digital healthcare systems like EMR and EHR medical apps, healthcare analytics, etc. The basic idea is to elevate patient care, disease management, and the overall healthcare experience while improving efficiency and cost management on the side of healthcare providers. On the initial curve, it helps to avoid duplication and errors, but on the higher levels, it can also improve the speed and precision of diagnosis. This can play a big role in making healthcare proactive, self-service oriented, and hassle-free.
Digital Imaging, for instance, is about visualization of lesions, radiological interpretation, and a rule-out or rule in diagnosis, explained Prof. Jaya Prakash in a recent webinar on “Ask Me Anything: Digital Health Programme by IISc and TalentSprint”. This also covers image processing and reconstruction. “In CES 2020, Digital Health was an enormous space. The global Digital Health market has grown from $144.2 billion in 2018 to $206 billion in 2020. That makes it a very attractive market. Strong technologies here are AI, Blockchain, etc.” He translated this growth from a talent perspective. “This is a space which marks the need for continuous learning.”
In a recent webinar on “Ask Me Anything: Digital Health Programme by IISc and TalentSprint”, Prof. Jaya Prakash and Prof. Ambedkar Dukkipati from IISc shared the details of Programme
Ramesh Mohanty and Susan Thomas from TalentSprint, also shared the important aspects of the special programme being started and executed in five modules. It underlines the ease of learning but with a significant depth covered in Digital Health. Learners can easily sharpen their capabilities with just some initial level of comprehension and comfort with new tools.
Prof. Ambedkar Dukkipati from IISc added that the programme would also focus on conceptual and hands-on aspects of machine learning, deep learning, imaging, and health tools. “Anything that you want to formalize – needs some level of basic proficiency. Like machine learning would need a certain mathematics understanding. We are not asking you to go from scratch, but some context and passion for these areas would be helpful. A grasp of Python, Tensor Flow, Pytorch, and CNN would be desirable. One should be able to understand some fundamental level of syntax and code.”
He also showed how other tools on data aspects would come in. “Everything involves optimization. We would cover probabilistic models. We will also give hands-on training on deep learning modules.”
As to statistical calculations, the course is more about solving the problem and not just calculating numbers, clarified the professors for some curious students.
Getting started
Digital Health are transformative technologies in healthcare, emphasized Prof. Dukkipati. “Join if you are willing to learn continuously. Or/and if you wish to make a technology change. Especially if you are not afraid of change. Join if you are young at heart and mind.”
Indeed. The past was about doctors wearing stethoscopes. But the future is about patients wearing devices and data. Start mastering this future early on with the right dose of talent building relevant capabilities in Digital Health.
