Sensors and healthcare 5.0: transformative shift in virtual care through emerging digital health technologies

Abstract

Emerging digital technologies continues to evolve posing unprecedented opportunities in health systems globally to improve healthcare services delivery. There has been significant progress in healthcare. However, the lack of emotive recognition coupled with a dearth of personalized and pervasive health applications and emotive smart devices calls for the integration of intelligent sensors health systems through emerging technologies. Although there has been significant progress in smart and connected health care, more research innovation, dissemination and technologies are needed to unbundle new opportunities and move towards healthcare 5.0. Healthcare is at the dawn of a paradigm change to reach the new era of smart disease control and detection, virtual care, smart health management, smart monitoring, and decision-making. Therefore, this study discusses the roles and capacities of sensors, their capabilities and other emerging technologies such as nanotechnology, 5 G technologies, drone technology, blockchain, robotics, big data, internet of things, artificial intelligence, and cloud computing. Healthcare 5.0 provides healthcare services including patient remote monitoring, tracking and virtual clinics, emotive telemedicine, ambient assisted living, smart self-management, wellness monitoring and control, smart treatment reminders, compliance and adherence, and personalized and connected health care. However, building resilience and robust healthcare 5.0 is not immune to challenges. Organizational challenges, technological and infrastructural barriers, lack of legal and regulatory frameworks and e-health policies, individual perceptions, misalignment with hospitals’ strategy, lack of funding, religious and cultural barriers are identified as potential barriers to the successful implementation of healthcare 5.0. Therefore, there is a need for building resilient technology-driven healthcare systems. To achieve this, there is a need for expanding technological infrastructure, provision of budgetary support based on sustainable business models, develop appropriate legal and e-health policies, standardization and synchronization of protocols, improving stakeholders’ engagement and involvement and establishment of private and public partnerships and investments.