As I process my week at CES (Formerly known as the consumer electronic show), I was blown away by all the amazing technology. This was true across a wide variety of spaces including drones, virtual reality (VR), 3D printing, smart homes, robotics, and yes digital health. 170,000 people at CES and over 20,000 products launched the week of CES means I missed a lot. However, I did get a chance to see a lot of the digital health solutions on display at CES. In fact, see most of my Digital Health coverage of CES on EMR and HIPAA.
While the event was enormous, the observation I’ve made most about digital health is that there was very little that was revolutionary when it comes to health care itself. Pretty much everything I saw was part of the evolution of digital health that we already understood. There was really no game changing technology, app, software, hardware or other solution that would dramatically change the course of healthcare.
In fact, if I were a hospital executive coming out of CES, I wouldn’t have any immediate action items on my list. Sure, there are a lot of fun technologies, but there really aren’t that many clinically relevant innovations at CES.
While I do think that’s the case today, I believe that’s going to change. If I were to compare digital health to the internet, we’re still working on compuserve or prodigy (Yes, those were the “internet” before their were web browsers). We don’t even have a great web browser developed and mobile computing wasn’t really even much of a thought. However, I see a lot of organizations starting to build something that innovative in healthcare. Plus, the building blocks are now in place that a unique entrepreneur will put together all these innovations in devices and data and create something that transforms healthcare.
Most hospitals aren’t entrepeneurs. So, the opportunities presented by digital health at CES aren’t that interesting. However, CES is a digital health entrepreneur’s playground. The opportunities to leverage technology to improve health are endless. The groundwork that’s been laid is amazing. It will just take a number of years for it to reach hospitals in a package that works for them.