Health 4.0: How Digitisation Drives Innovation in the Healthcare Sector

Driven by networked Electronic Health Record systems, Artificial Intelligence, real-time data from wearable devices with an overlay of invisible user interfaces and improved analytics, a revolution is afoot in the healthcare industry. Over the next few years, it is likely to fundamentally change how healthcare is delivered and how the outcomes are measured. The focus on collaboration, coherence, and convergence will make healthcare more predictive and personalised. This revolution is called Health 4.0. Data portability allows patients and their physicians to access it anytime anywhere and enhanced analytics allows for differential diagnosis and medical responses that can be predictive, timely, and innovative. Health 4.0 allows the value of data more consistently and effectively. It can pinpoint areas of improvement and enable decisions that are more informed. What it also does is help move the entire healthcare industry from a system that is reactive and focused on fee-for-service to a system that is value-based, which measures outcomes and ensures proactive prevention (Thuemmler, Bai, 2017). In this paper, the authors discuss how digitisation is paving the way for data-driven innovation in the healthcare systems. They elaborate on the opportunities and challenges for all stakeholders involved and discuss how emerging technologies can help overcome the inherent rigidity of today’s healthcare ecosystem. Following on from this, the authors explain the importance of research on the actual design of smart healthcare products and product service systems of the future and the challenges faced from the viewpoint of design practice.