This insightful review article, “The Recent Progress and Applications of Digital Technologies in Healthcare: A Review,” authored by Maksut Senbekov, Timur Saliev, Zhanar Bukeyeva, Aigul Almabayeva, Marina Zhanaliyeva, Nazym Aitenova, Yerzhan Toishibekov, and Ildar Fakhradiyev, was published on December 4, 2020, in the International Journal of Telemedicine and Applications. The publication emerged from research conducted at S.D. Asfendiyarov Kazakh National Medical University, NJSC “Astana Medical University,” and the Institute of Experimental Biology in Almaty and Nur-Sultan, Kazakhstan.
The article addresses the profound shift occurring in the classic healthcare model, which has traditionally relied on hospitals and outpatient clinics. The authors highlight that while medical digital technologies offer improved accessibility and flexibility of healthcare for the public, including open information on health, treatment, and biomedical research, many issues related to their reliability, safety, testing, and ethical aspects remain unresolved. The primary purpose of this comprehensive review is to discuss and analyze the recent advancements in the application of big data, artificial intelligence (AI), telemedicine, blockchain platforms, and smart devices within both healthcare and medical education contexts.
Methodology: To achieve its aim, the review conducted a thorough publication search across major academic databases, including Google Scholar, PubMed, Web of Sciences, Medline, Wiley Online Library, and CrossRef. The search was limited to peer-reviewed publications in English, published between 2000 and 2020. Key terms used for the search encompassed “big data,” “artificial intelligence,” “telemedicine,” “internet of things,” “blockchain,” “wearables,” “smart devices,” “medical education,” “virtual clinical trials,” and “3D printing”. Out of 252 identified papers, 152 were ultimately selected and discussed based on specific exclusion criteria, ensuring a focused and relevant analysis.
Major Findings and Key Concepts: The literature search revealed that the demand for digital health technologies significantly increased due to recent pandemics, particularly COVID-19, which underscored the urgent need for rapid and effective solutions to manage and treat infections. The review delves into the applications and challenges across several key digital health domains:
- Artificial Intelligence (AI): AI is shown to significantly improve the performance and ability of diagnostic platforms, optimize treatment processes for increased efficiency and lower costs, and facilitate biomedical experiments and clinical trials. Specific applications include enhancing medical imaging (MRI, CT, ultrasound) in radiology, improving diagnostics and practice management in primary care, and optimizing cardiological monitoring and diagnosis. AI-based platforms also assist in identifying and reducing epidemiologic risks, crucial for prioritizing patients during pandemics like COVID-19. In medical education, AI can complement curricula, facilitate understanding of human anatomy via augmented vision, and improve diagnostic accuracy through simulators. It is also recognized for its role in cybersecurity given the vast amounts of accumulated personal data.
- Big Data and E-Health: Big data is increasingly used for improving and optimizing management, analysis, and forecasting in healthcare. The transition to Electronic Health Records (EHR) has led to an explosive growth of healthcare data, enabling faster processing, improved service quality, lower costs, and reduced medical errors. Big data platforms support biomedical research, help analyze rapidly increasing medical information, and address challenges related to data volume, velocity, variety, and veracity. The concept of e-health, with its focus on automated and timely medical information, aims to provide safe, fair, high-quality, and sustainable patient-focused healthcare services, including electronic health passports and prescriptions.
- Blockchain Technology: This decentralized peer-to-peer platform offers secure storage and sharing of information, making it difficult to alter. Its unique characteristics, such as decentralization, transparency, and anonymity, are being leveraged to improve clinical trial management, ensure regulatory compliance, and facilitate secure sharing of electronic medical records. Blockchain also addresses issues of data security, unauthorized exchanges, and healthcare abuses like fake drugs. In medical education, it can optimize learning module tracking, compare methodologies across institutions, and securely manage licensing and certification information.
- Smart Devices (Internet of Things): Smart devices, including wearables and mobile phones, play a crucial role in monitoring vital body functions and diagnostics. They generate continuous data flow, contributing to big data sets, and enable remote monitoring by physicians, reducing hospitalization needs and costs. Smartphones, often integrated with wearable sensors, can track various health parameters like ECG, detecting conditions such as atrial fibrillation, falls, bradycardia, and tachycardia. These devices are particularly important for remote health monitoring during pandemics and are also valuable tools in medical education for situational learning and easy information access.
- Virtual Clinical Trials: This promising area involves remote patient health information retrieval using digital technologies like tablets, smartphone apps, and wearable sensors. Virtual trials offer advantages over traditional models by reducing the need for frequent physical visits, making studies accessible to patients with mobility problems or in rural areas, and proving especially relevant during pandemics. They can be more cost-effective, increase patient engagement and retention, reduce drug development risks, and allow for real-time data access for adaptive trial designs.
- 3D Printing: This technology has advanced significantly in healthcare, allowing the manufacturing of models of organs, permanent implants, and testing of medical devices. It aids surgeons in accurate surgical planning, precise selection of prosthesis components, and the creation of custom instruments and implants. Additional applications include confirming osteoporosis treatment results, testing pharmaceutical products, replicating heart valves and human ears, personalized drug printing, and even printing synthetic organs for transplantation or toxicity tests. In medical education, 3D printed anatomical models enhance productivity and learning, reduce reliance on cadaveric samples, and facilitate simulation training across various medical specialties.
Conclusion: The authors conclude that the digital revolution is undeniably reshaping healthcare systems globally, enhancing accessibility, quality, and flexibility of medical care in both developed and developing countries. Despite these significant advantages, the widespread implementation of digital health platforms faces numerous challenges. These include concerns regarding the clinical effectiveness, reliability, and safety of proposed technologies, necessitating meticulous testing and rigorous clinical studies adhering to ethical principles. A notable barrier is the lack of official regulations and recommendations, which impedes adequate validation and approbation of novel digital health technologies by stakeholders, demanding more dedicated scientific research before deployment. Other challenges encompass insufficient funding, an entrenched reliance on traditional medical and educational approaches, a lack of concrete clinical guidelines, and a disconnection between industry innovators and practicing healthcare professionals. Ethical considerations, particularly patient privacy, risks versus benefits, access and usability, and data management, are paramount and require universal ethical regulations for health data protection.
REFERENCE: Senbekov, M., Saliev, T., Bukeyeva, Z., Almabayeva, A., Zhanaliyeva, M., Aitenova, N., Toishibekov, Y., & Fakhradiyev, I. (2020). The recent progress and applications of digital technologies in healthcare: A review. International Journal of Telemedicine and Applications, 2020, Article ID 8830200. https://doi.org/10.1155/2020/8830200
