The Medtech sector needs to address the existing barriers to thwart its growth post-pandemic. 

The Medtech sector is amongst the most imperative domain of the healthcare industry. It contributes heavily to the healthcare machinery and tools required to carry out medical procedures. Over the years, technological advancements such as robotics and artificial intelligence have expanded the scope in Medtech area. Many conventional procedures like laparoscopic surgeries, are now replaced with robotic surgeries. Moreover, companies like Johnson and Johnson, MZOR, and Titan medical are heavily investing in creating tools equipped with technology. Additionally, many redundant tasks that required human intervention earlier have now become technology-driven. For example, many MedTech companies are manufacturing tools that aid in patient care and perform laboratory procedures.

With COVID 19, the exploitation of technology by MedTech industries has accelerated. This can be observed in how medical institutes are handling COVID 19 using equipment driven with technology. The global artificial intelligence in the MedTech market is expected to increase from US$719 million in 2017 to US$19.2 billion by 2025 at a CAGR of 49.6% between 2018-2025.

However, as technology permeates the Medtech sector, bigger challenges are getting unveiled that needs a strategic solution.

Mismanagement of Data

A PwC report indicates that more than 30 trillion gigabytes of medical data generated remain unexplored every year. Most AI/ML techniques utilize huge dataset to train the model. But data regulation in healthcare institute adds to the problem of training AI-enabled model. Additionally, most data collection procedures are carried out through manual labor. Even when data experts are employed, the cleaning of data takes a considerable amount of time. Also, the pre-existing silos between dispersed departments add to the concern of data sharing and management.

Privacy concerns

A report by IBM states that the healthcare industry is ranked amongst the heavily targeted industry by digital attackers. Technological devices, which generate data across various sources, play a major catalyst for these attacks. As more people are getting educated about malware, ransomware and cyberattacks, hospitals and patients often do not want to deploy procedures that have the possibility of invading privacy and security. This leaves MedTech companies in a very tough position as most tools created today are technology ridden. Additionally, most companies do not comply with the healthcare standards, which include efficient management while sharing the data and taking patient’s consent to do so. This increases the possibility of data breach and invasion of the patient’s demographic identities, ensuing a possible cyberattack.

With COVID 19, the world has already witnessed amplification in the data breach and security infringement, thus making cybersecurity a key challenge that needs to be addressed. Henceforth post-COVID 19 the challenges for the MedTech sector regarding the adoption of technologically-equipped tools will surge.

Cost-effectiveness

COVID 19 has exposed that the global healthcare system is skewed and in dire need of infrastructural reformation. It also highlighted the economic instability of many healthcare institutes. Post-COVID, when healthcare institutes will look for cost-effective solutions, many small, low and medium-budget institutes, will covet from employing solutions that exceed their financial capacity.