In this third instalment of the four-part Connected Life series, Cisco Malaysia’s managing director Kumaran Singaram shares about what it means to have Connected Healthcare and the importance of healthcare access as well as the core pillars for national development.

THE advent of information and communications technology (ICT) is changing the way healthcare providers provide care. The integration of advanced technology into healthcare services is promoting more equitable access to quality healthcare by Malaysians – a primary objective of the Health Ministry.

By empowering patients through ICT, the healthcare system can benefit directly by enabling patients to maintain and improve their health through informed choices. More informed patients are more likely to push for higher quality, evidence-based care delivered as economically as possible. 

In recent years, developments in technology and innovation have increasingly made quality healthcare more cost-effective and accessible across the world. These developments are transforming the health systems of many countries, Malaysia included. But it is generally conceded that the healthcare sector is still behind other major industries in the adoption and dispersion of technology.

Today’s healthcare providers face a daunting challenge: sustaining or improving patient care levels despite shortages of clinicians and nurses, increasing competition and financial pressure.

Additionally, healthcare is highly autonomous in terms of organisation and delivery, and the current ad hoc legacy networks have been built by different public and private providers for different reasons. These networks display a range of inconsistent and incompatible design and operational aspects, and only some are interconnected.



Boosting healthcare efficiencies

Builders and developers can help healthcare organisations rise up to the challenges in an innovative way by designing buildings with a standards-based Internet protocol (IP) network to deliver and manage the hospital’s services more efficiently and at a lower cost – in essence, by providing the necessary infrastructure to a Connected Healthcare vision.

Healthcare providers will benefit in terms of being able to differentiate their services, increase staff productivity and reduce costs with IP-based applications and centralised control of systems. Establishing a national health connectivity infrastructure will likely lay the foundation for building connectivity in other service areas such as education, public safety and regional economic development.

Connected Healthcare brings together all the necessary elements in a building to work for the patient and the caregiver. The need for interoperability in healthcare ICT has gone from an item on the private wish list of ICT insiders to a public priority of governments. Besides, an efficient deployment of technology in healthcare will minimise the barriers of distance and geography to enhance access and facilitate the delivery of integrated healthcare. 



Communications as catalyst for collaboration

The more interactive and networked the nature of connection, the higher the probability of successful collaboration taking place. In other words, providers can obtain and exchange information and services at the point of care to reduce errors, create faster flow-through and improve patient satisfaction – in short, help ensure better healthcare.

Still, changes that are transformational often occur in incremental stages. Nonetheless, manageable individual steps, while not magically resolving the problems plaguing the healthcare system, will yield tangible benefits now and in the future as long as key players are careful in picking out a path that leads to ubiquitous electronic connectivity.

In a Connected Healthcare environment, future healthcare solutions and practices need to connect and empower societies, care providers and consumers to advance quality of life and create additional value. Ultimately, it is about providing patients in both the developed and developing worlds with access to affordable and available care of good quality.

Connected Healthcare, with the help of network infrastructure, can play a big positive role, and an adequate networking infrastructure means that the right information gets to the right people at the right time, all through the system, from nurse to ministry.