As tech becomes an integral part of healthcare patients will increasingly turn to apps as a first port of call, says ORCHA COO Tim Andrews.
The Daresbury-based company reviews health apps so that healthcare professionals can prescribe apps based on their individual needs. Users can also go straight to the database to search for apps.
ORCHA has been nominated for our upcoming list of Health Tech Pioneers.
“People already use apps and wearables for diet, nutrition, sleep, stress and low level mental health challenges,” Andrews told BusinessCloud.
“So health will all become naturally supported by apps and when people become ill they will reach for an app naturally.
“Where historically we would have gone to our GPs and in many cases they would then give us a referral. It’s a positive intervention.
“This could be for something as simple as how to use their Ventolin inhaler – one of our best apps is the Zephyr Guide and it’s as simple as that – through to another great one like SkinVision which is all about checking moles.
“There are too many different scenarios to say definitively that apps will become the first-line of defence and they should never replace clinical help but they can act as a filter.”
Part of the reason for the rise in apps is that as the population ages the number of digital natives seeking healthcare will also increase.
This will help a transformation that is underway in healthcare more generally.
“Healthcare needs to embrace tech,” said Andrews.
“They’re now getting tech in to improve processes and procedures that other industries have been doing for 10-15 years or more.
“They’re just catching up with their user base because there are people out there using apps now. Of course the 60-year-olds they want to reach now in 20-30 years’ time will be digital natives and it will be a different audience.”
Initiatives like the Health Tech Pioneers list are important to help move this transition along, says Andrews.
“The more that people can become aware and the more we can get the message about digital health out the better,” he said.
“It’s all about showcasing the great solutions that support healthcare.
“For us it’s all about getting a higher profile because we want more and more people to find us and use what we produce to help get better or fitter, or any combination of those things.”
Deadline for entries for the Health Tech Pioneers list is Monday 22nd January 2018.
We want to hear about the people and companies revolutionising healthcare and improving patient care with technology.
Criteria:
- Fill in this questionnaire by January 22, 2018
- Tech means any company using tech in some way whether hardware or software or data
- Nominations must be from within the UK
- Mark any confidential information clearly
- Nominations must include any supporting evidence e.g. patents, turnover, partnerships etc
- Editor’s decision will be final