Smart tech: Efficient ... and good for our health?

One aspect of the smart-city vision that tends to get less attention than the big two — energy or transport — is health and well-being. It’s no surprise, considering the subject is a far softer, squishier one than nuts-and-bolts technology or bits-and-bytes IT.

But energy-saving and efficiency-boosting technologies are already having a big impact for some health-care providers. And industry professionals foresee even more benefits to come.

The true smart perks for health care won’t come through sleek, humanoid robotic helpers (Japan’s elderly have already been put off by such efforts: “We want humans caring for us, not machines”) but through less visible, behind-the-scenes technologies. Better information and communication technologies (ICT) could provide more people-friendly solutions, according to Toshio Obi, director of the Institute for E-Government at Japan’s Waseda University. During a presentation he was set to give today at a Washington, DC, conference on smarter health and wellness, Obi outlined how ICT could help Japan’s ageing population through social networking, e-health services and remote supervision through mobile and GPS systems.

Using mobile phones to provide health care, mhealth as it’s called, can also help improve services for people in poor and rural areas. Microsoft, for example, is supporting research in Africa that’s exploring everything from SMS services for better care of tuberculosis to mobile phone-assisted surgery. And platforms like ChildCount+ are reaching out to children who were once “invisible” to health-care providers because they were born in small villages far from hospitals.

Meanwhile, virtualisation technologies are helping large hospitals and health organisations reduce computing-related costs while speeding up access to patient information. The Western North Carolina Health Network is already saving considerable time through a “virtual” records system from IBM that integrates patient data from all 16 of its facilities. Across the US, in fact, electronic health records are being touted as a way to not only improve patient care but curb the wild inflation in health-costs, and Medicare and Medicaid providers are being offered incentives to upgrade their systems.

While promising initiatives like these are under way in both developed and developing countries, it’s clear we’ve barely scratched the surface of what smarter technologies could mean for human health and well-being. The next 10 years should see some amazing developments if we can keep today’s momentum going.