EMEA

While it feels like it was only yesterday that Expo 2020 Dubai opened its doors, the first World Expo in the MEASA region concluded last month. Dubai-based Rachel McArthur asks whether we will follow through on the lessons learned in healthcare from the event.

Despite significant investment and well over a decade of different transformation plans and initiatives, there’s still much to do before we can say the health and care system has truly gone through a digital revolution.

Digital technologies are constantly changing. Hardware is getting faster and more efficient. Software can harness these hardware improvements to improve the functionality of technology. And so healthcare staff and citizens will hopefully have access to tools that allow tasks to be completed quicker, or more intuitively according to Dr Pritesh Mistry, King's Fund, UK. 

Health is in the throes of some of the most significant changes as systems reel from a variety of rapidly changing environments. Dr Charles Alessi, Chief Clinical Officer at HIMSS, explores lessons learned, as we look cautiously to a better 2022.

What still seems to be missing from the criteria is any assessment of the evidence of how well a product works and to what extent, says Prof Sam Shah, chief medical strategy officer, Numan.

Germany will soon be embarking on a national project to assess the digital maturity of its 2,000 hospitals. If it focuses on understanding the impact on clinicians and patients, it can catch up with the world’s digital health leaders, says Armin Scheuer, VP international business development, HIMSS. 

We are witnessing a race in the vaccine rollout. A race towards the light at the end of a tunnel and a race which will likely define the next few years, according to Dr Charles Alessi, chief clinical officer at HIMSS. 

The right to health, not just the access to healthcare, requires a holistic understanding of how we can provide a better quality of life and wellbeing for the individual and society, argues Bogi Eliasen, director of health at the Copenhagen Institute for Future Studies and a member of the HIMSS Future50 Community.

For many of us, 2021 feels a lot like 2020 with lockdowns imposed and hospital pressures increasing. However, there is light at the end of the tunnel with several vaccines now being rolled out globally, says Dr Saif Abed, founding partner, AbedGraham.

The politicians of the UK and the European Union have finally reached their post-Brexit trade agreement. A word that we heard on every news update was sovereignty, quickly followed by the debate about the cost of such independence, according to Nick Hopkinson, a CIO and Principal Associate with Ethical Healthcare Consulting, UK.