The stay-at-home hospital: medical device innovation and virtual wards

James Wells, international freight manager at Aramex UK, investigates the area of virtual wards and how it’s being heavily driven by medical device innovation. 

Whilst the term ‘virtual ward’ may seem like it’s come straight out of Blade Runner movie, the concept is already being introduced in hospitals across the UK. Whilst it still remains in its early stages, this innovative form of treatment is being driven heavily by the pandemic and the need to minimise contact and avoid additional patients in hospitals at any one time. But how exactly is this new treatment being developed and what does this mean for the medical device sector that is the driving force behind it?

The next frontier of care delivery

Whilst the pandemic caused an abrupt halt to all elective surgeries, those appointments related to ongoing health conditions such as diabetes or heart conditions were still able to receive vital treatment through the innovation of virtual health. Development in medical devices has meant that patients can exchange health data with their clinician completely remotely. Doctors can monitor a patient’s symptoms, provide advice on care and prompt early intervention, and be alerted to disease progression. This can all be achieved from the comfort of a patient’s home. This solution limits the need to visit hospitals which is both positive in reducing the possibility of transmission but also for patient care, as for some of these patients, visits to the hospitals had become the norm, but remote devices mean they receive the same level of care but without the hospital visits.

Pushing the boundaries of healthcare with virtual wards

Even prior to the pandemic, the medical device sector was poised for steady growth, with the industry expected to reach $80 billion by 2030. Connected health devices come in a multitude of forms, there are IoT enable sensors, at-home cardiac monitors or wearable devices that track key vitals. It’s not just the device type that has a wide range either, their applications are expansive, solutions have been created for maternity which monitor the progress of pregnancies or wearables that consistently monitor vitals for those who suffered from heart failure or cardiometabolic disorders.

Whatever the solution may be, each one is helping to provide a new era for care.

One amazing example of how the virtual wards are being implemented in the UK health service is Huma, a UK-based healthcare firm that deliver digital ‘hospital at home’ through a decentralised clinical trial platform gaining real-time data from patient’s smartphones that is connected to devices that monitor key vitals. They have integrated ‘virtual wards’ now across six separate sites.

Demand and supply balance

Whilst the introduction of virtual wards will deliver improved patient care and greater efficiency to hospitals discharge and bed management, there is the simple fact of having those devices available to achieve this type of care. Most of these technologies are relatively new to the sector and a vast uptake in production will be required to supply the demand. With an ageing population and many already having long-standing illnesses, this volume will only continue to grow over time. Whilst the US is known as a leader in the medical device sector, with 41% of the global market share, the UK is a growing division, consisting of 12% of the European market share. Many of the manufacturers in the UK, are SME or start-up sized companies, and therefore production needs to be scaled significantly to effectively rollout to the solution across hospitals.

A growth on the production side must be replicated in distribution. The devices are useless if they don’t reach the people who need them.

The huge growth in this market in such a short space of time means that a greater number of medical devices will need to be distributed both nationally and internationally. These specialist devices are highly sensitive and need to be handled carefully, and often need to be delivered under tight deadlines. Meaning both the manufacturers and logistics suppliers need to adapt their operations to be more agile to deliver sensitive goods at scale, which is easier said than done. Whilst medical devices may not require the same level of control as pharmaceutical products, they are still sensitive products that encompass lots of high-tech components that would be damaged with the slightest drop or exposure to humid temperatures or rain. To maintain the same level of control across high volumes of devices, stringent monitoring must be encompassed into the entire logistical process.

It is also important for those shipping into Northern Ireland to consider the recent changes to regulatory requirements. The Medical Device Regulations (2017/745) and the in-vitro Diagnostic Medical Device Regulations (2017/746) will come into effective in the next year. As the rules for placing medical devices on the Northern Ireland market will differ from those applicable to Great Britain, manufacturers that are entering this new ‘remote’ devices field need to consider this within their distribution processes.

Virtual health is at the forefront of the healthcare sector and the innovation emerging in the medical device sector will continue to push the boundaries of what is possible.