Introduction
It seems reasonable to state that today, any industry is being affected by a considerable number of changes. These changes are diverse – starting from climate and ending with economies. The healthcare sector is not an exception; moreover, within the global scope, healthcare companies should adapt their business strategies even more than the ones from other industries. Such a state of affairs is caused by the fact that the provision of high-quality treatment has become a crucial goal worldwide. All the civilized countries admit that the health of their citizens is a key element of their policies as it is a foundation for overall wellbeing and economic development. Hence, the theme of how various shifts affect the healthcare industry seems relevant to explore. In the report, this industry will be discussed through the prism of global, environmental, and digital changes, after which a consistent conclusion will be provided.
Global Changes
Nowadays, globalization impacts every segment of humans’ life to a great extent. It may be defined as the density and depth enhancement of international relations with the increasing number of global interactions and the level of interdependence. The primary characteristic of the globalization process is that principles, rules, and even cultural imperatives become unified and spread worldwide. The phenomenon of global society occurs, which means the emergence of a business environment and stakeholders that have common aims and interests. Furthermore, states and international organizations start acting in conjunction to develop universal political and economic principles.
It might be apparent that all the listed factors influence the healthcare industry substantially. In particular, among the most prominent features of global changes is medical tourism. According to Trivitron Healthcare (2017, para. 3), “most patients from European countries and America are traveling to other countries to seek medical treatment and care.” Such a situation takes place due to unaffordable healthcare prices in the developed states and other disparities. However, a foreign patient may attend the US or a European country to obtain treatment of better quality. It should be claimed that medical tourism can “reduce preventive healthcare advances and create the need for sophisticated private clinics to meet the needs of international patients” (Trivitron Healthcare, 2017, para. 7). This tourism puts considerable pressure on healthcare companies, forcing them to find ways to reduce prices, which is a visible characteristic of the system today (Fervers et al., 2016). Nevertheless, several other important aspects should be taken into account.
International organizations, such as the World Health Organization (WHO) or the United Nations (UN), aspire to establish universal standards of healthcare globally. For example, the UN sets sustainable development goals that aim to address international challenges coherently and efficiently. Among them, the third goal is to provide humanity with good health and wellbeing (The UN, n.d.). This contributes to the improvement and universalization of the healthcare industry. What is more, under the guidance of these organizations, healthcare providers collaborate (Trivitron Healthcare, 2017). It leads to the free flow of medicines, facilities, and professionals across borders. To summarize, global changes have both positive and negative effects on the industry, and the globalization process seems inevitable – the healthcare companies are to adapt their business strategies to it.
Environmental Changes
To an equivalent extent to major natural processes, a human is becoming the dominant force of changes on Earth. The Anthropocene is characterized by substantial humanity’s environmental impact on the planet, which seems apparent now. This impact causes many notable shifts within the scope of the environment that influence human activities vice versa. The healthcare industry is involved in the latter process and plays an essential role in it – but not only the positive one. The sector utilizes energy-intensive facilities that generate “millions of tons of waste solid, liquid and gas, including potent pollutants like dioxins (from the incineration of PVC) and mercury” (World Medical Association, n.d., para. 1). Hence, healthcare companies are under great pressure to reduce such an impact and use environment-friendly technologies.
Climate changes have direct consequences for the industry’s development, with large financial expenses for government, society, and business. For the firms, these challenges affect strategies, policies, and operations. “While business has been addressing climate for years now, much of its work has focused on climate change mitigation” (Oger, 2018, para. 5). Nowadays, companies from all sectors are to maintain society in its adaptation to the mentioned impacts.
The healthcare industry has a critical role in addressing the above issue that shapes its structure and policies significantly. Environmental changes affect every human, which has profound and long-term consequences that may undermine years of progress in healthcare. As these changes intensify, their impact on human health does the same. They include a wide range of variables – starting from the duration of extreme heat and ending with changes in the dissemination of various diseases. For the industry, “the notion of [climate] resilience is central, as these companies must stay in business and ensure continuity to be able to supply drugs and health solutions to patients” (Oger, 2018, para. 11). Hence, healthcare firms should adapt their quality-ensuring systems and supply chains to climate-related issues and opportunities. For instance, pharmaceutical enterprises may start identifying products and services that are likely to be under climate change impact. Then, healthcare companies could evolve new drug and delivery systems that provide resolution to climate-bond diseases. Such an approach may contribute to the development of both climate and health resilience.
Digital Changes
Digitalization has become an essential element of each economy’s sector by now. It should be stated that in the healthcare industry, there have been many new achievements and implementations in this regard over the last few decades. A plethora of new technologies have been developed and utilized. Generally, “Digital transformation in healthcare is the positive impact of technology in healthcare” (Reddy, 2019, para. 3). The companies aim to gain maximum benefits from this process as it results in reduced costs and amount of routine work.
Healthcare firms have the opportunity to use new digital inventions to make their operations smooth and atomized. For example, recent digitalization changes result in the fact that most healthcare providers have shifted to electronic medical records. It contributes to fast patient identification and harmonized workflow that leads to a minimum of errors while prescribing treatment plans and procedures. Then, many people prefer to search for a particular medical solution on their own. It means that they tend to do online research on various symptoms that occur. At times, these people look for web consultations with a physician rather than attend a hospital. Healthcare providers conduct a substantial online campaign and promotion to make such patients understand that the only reasonable way to treat a disease is, in most cases, the attendance of a specialized establishment.
Furthermore, there has been the growth of wearable medical devices that allow a patient to monitor some essential indicators. The actors of the healthcare industry have created particular IT departments that are responsible for the development of related applications. The mentioned devices “have the potential to transform healthcare delivery thanks to their ubiquity and ease of use” (Edelmann, 2019, para. 5). Then, the applications make gathering information convenient, quick, and reliable; it might be assumed that their further implementation has almost no boundaries. Thus, digital changes may be considered as the ones that have a mostly positive effect on the healthcare industry. Business operations become easy to manage and control, and treatment services start being affordable. For the companies, in the case of appropriate investing, digitalization may result in increased and significant added value, as well as profit margins.
Conclusion
In conclusion, it seems rational to claim that the healthcare sector faces many notable changes nowadays. The report investigated the issue through three dimensions – global, environmental, and digital. The study shows that the shifts caused by these dimensions have a significant impact on the industry. Globalization makes the firms adapt to universal rules and principles, environmental changes – to climate-related demands, and digitalization – to the increased use of electronic devices and online sources. Nevertheless, all the mentioned factors also can provide the sector with a substantial number of opportunities if its actors adapt their business strategies and policies to contemporary conditions. Both companies and clients of the industry will benefit from such an approach.
References
Edelmann, S. (2019). 7 ways digitization will shape the future of healthcare. HealthcareTransformers.
Fervers, L., Oser, P., & Picot, G. (2016). Globalization and healthcare policy: a constraint on growing expenditures. Journal of European Public Policy, 23(2), 197–216.
Oger, C., Lovatt, J., & Farnier, L. (2018). The impacts of climate on health: why business should care and how to act. BSR.
Reddy, M. (2019). Digital transformation in healthcare in 2020: 7 key trends. Digital Authority Partners.
The UN. (n.d.). #Envision2030 Goal 3: good health and well-being.
Trivitron Healthcare (2017). The future of healthcare globalization.
World Medical Association. (n.d.). Green health: Reducing the environmental impact of healthcare.