Economic Aspects of eHealth

Direct links to projects in this IS Policy Areas
EPIS

SIMPHS - Strategic Intelligence Monitor on Personal Health Systems


Strategic forward-looking priority setting

Building the European Information Society is a key ambition of the renewed Lisbon objectives as currently framed by the i2010 initiative. With the Strategic forward looking priority setting activities we support the i2010 policy initiative through research that is problem and policy driven, prospective and scientific and is carried out in collaboration with internationally renowned experts.

We also aim to develop a future vision, by identifying and analysing the evolution of technologies, business structures, innovation models and potential disruptions that may affect Europe in the coming decade, so as to better understand the way ICTs help shape society. Considering that businesses offer novel services to satisfy users needs, we analyse user perceptions, attitudes, needs and their role and contribution to innovative processes or in other words the implications of such user decisions on citizen-centric services and lifestyles. Priority is given to identifying policies that impact positively economic growth and jobs creation and help create an innovation-friendly environment. Research objectives will be achieved through a combination of integrated market and business model studies, and techno-economic foresight analysis (scenario building, road mapping, impact and demand analysis). As a result, information on barriers to market entry, skills, access to patented technologies and emerging business models will be collected that aims to contribute to the creation of an innovation-friendly, transparent, level-playing field for businesses to operate in.

Due to the rising demand for healthcare, and in agreement with DG INFSO, our research will concentrate on the use of ICTs to enhance the individual's extended 'quality of life' and assess existing market conditions, including stakeholder strategies, business models and innovation processes that empower patients to contribute to their own care. As a complementary activity, we will also investigate the role of Social Computing in Healthcare and Biomedical research.

 

Scope

Personal Health Systems

Socio-demographic and socio-economic changes over time pose severe problems to the health system as it is today: ageing, chronic diseases, the rising costs for health, the shortage of skilled health practitioners, the limitations of financing and insurance models, the more prominent role of patients in the entire system, it will all put a burden on the health system. At the same time, people give greater importance to being and remaining healthy, up to advanced ages. To cope with the challenges, radical changes are needed which may lead to a paradigm shift in the health system: from the hospital to the home, from cure to care and prevention, from sickness to well-being. The development of Personal Health Systems (PHS) underscores these changes with increased interest for care delivered at home and remote monitoring. PHS are basic to the new health paradigm 'under construction'. Medical markets are expected to grow in the coming decades. The patient monitoring market already represents a €800 million market globally. The situation in Europe today however reflects a very fragmented and dispersed market, lacking the business models to cope with the promises of the future market, while the market is in high flux as well. What is indicated as a promising market and is identified as a Lead Market for Europe needs to be better researched in order to enable appropriate measures to be taken by the European Union to reap the benefits both in terms of improved quality of life for its citizens, a better quality of work for medical practitioners, and a better cost-efficient and competitive system for the European Union. This requires an in-depth study of market and innovation dynamics within the field of personalised health systems.

Leader: Fabienne Abadie
Main client: DG INFSO: regulatory framework of the IS and the ICT sector.
Under the Area: TEFIS
Head of Area: Ioannis Maghiros

Objectives

JRC-IPTS sets out to investigate the market and innovation dynamics of Personal Health Systems in a three year research project. The research project will concentrate around the construction of a Strategic Intelligence Monitor (SIM), encompassing a number of research tools which together will allow for the quantitative and qualitative analysis of the market dynamics and the innovation dynamics around Personal Health Systems.

Policy relevance

The European Commission's Lead Market Initiative (LMI) has identified eHealth as one of the highly innovative markets ('lead markets') for which there is a clear demand and a strong European industry base and where public policy has an important role to play. Telemedicine/homecare and personalised health systems and services have been highlighted by the eHealth Taskforce report in 2007 (in preparation of the LMI) as one of the areas where strong growth is predicted and where European companies are believed to be well placed to seize the new opportunities arising in the European eHealth market as well as in world markets.

The business community is also present in a number of European platforms, which have been initiated through the 'sense of urgency' arising from the perception that opportunities of PHS do exist but their realisation fails to happen. There are currently 30 ETPs, among which nine ICT ETPs, three of the latter focusing partly on Personal Health Systems (EPoSS, NESSI and Nanomedicine, see previous section).

 

Contribution

The first phase (2009) of the project will be dedicated to the construction of the Strategic Intelligence Monitor. The SIM will deploy qualitative and quantitative tools to arrive at an understanding of market and innovation dynamics within (selected segments of) the PHS-market. The first phase of the project will be used to define the SIM, to develop the building blocks of the SIM and to define and determine the data categories and data sources needed for populating the SIM. In order to test and validate the SIM and to improve the respective building blocks of the SIM, the Remote Patient Monitoring and Health Treatment market (RMT) will be studied. The RMT-market is a market which is emerging within Europe but still faces many challenges. It is an interesting object for the study of market and innovation dynamics and for the first use of the strategic intelligence monitor. It reveals many of the developments which are typical for today's health systems (move towards out-of-hospital care, increased intelligence of medical devices, patient empowerment, need for appropriate ICT infrastructures, need for appropriate business models, newcomers seeking for new business while originating from outside the health market, etc.).

 

SIMPHS Events

NEW: SIMPHS Validation Workshop, 17-18 November 2009

The workshop's aim was to present and validate with experts the findings of the first ten months of SIMPHS research. In particular in order to understand the Remote Patient Monitoring and Treatment (RMT) segment of the PHS market, quantitative and qualitative data has been collected in the Strategic Intelligence Monitor and analysed by the team. Main findings were summarised in a Discussion Paper that was sent to participants before the workshop. Following the narrative of this paper, the 1.5 day workshop was dedicated to presenting and discussing with experts the main issues emerging from our analysis of the RMT market.

After a brief introduction on the goals and context of the SIMPHS research, IPTS presented the "Big picture" putting the question forward of "What is the problem with RMT", answering the question with selected evidence from the review of RMT companies as well as pilots and projects focusing on RMT, highlighting main outcomes, which led to addressing the various barriers that impede RMT take up in an ecosystem perspective. This was followed by a presentation from Rand Europe on their study on Business models for eHealth and an overview by IPTS of selected successful RMT business cases. The second day of the workshop started with the presentation by VTT of a SIMPHS country study, which provided insights into the national context and initiatives for RMT in France, Germany, Sweden, Italy, the UK and the Netherlands, based on the outcome of desk research and experts interviews in those countries. Along the same lines, IPTS presented findings for the Netherlands and Italy. The workshop was concluded with a session discussing lessons from the SIMPHS research and implications for policy as well as next steps for the SIMPHS research.

For the full agenda, please click here. Detailed minutes of the workshop are available here. 

Earlier SIMPHS events (2009)

Completed Projects

  • EPIS: European Perspectives on Information Society
    EPIS aims at improving the strategic intelligence of the European decision-makers by taking a prospective view towards the evolution of ICT.
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Dissemination activities

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