Deepening Digital Transformation in Healthcare: The Path Forward – Insights from Tianfu Health Talk CHS 2021

In a mediatized social context, digital technology has become an integral component of the fundamental logic underpinning society. In this era, it is difficult to discuss industrial upgrading without addressing digitalization.

Although the healthcare industry is more rigorous and its digitalization level lags behind other sectors, under a series of new policies—including volume-based procurement, DRG (Diagnosis-Related Groups), DIP (Big Data Diagnosis-Intervention Packet), and medical service price reforms—as well as industrial structural adjustments and value negotiations among various stakeholders, digitalization has become as indispensable to the healthcare industry as smartphones are to internet users, forming an essential component for every participant in the healthcare ecosystem.

Understanding the intrinsic logic and ultimate objectives of digital transformation in healthcare is crucial for addressing current “chokepoint” challenges and identifying the direction for industry development driven by digital technologies.

On October 11, the Tianfu Health Talk · CHS 2021 6th China Big Health Industry Upgrade Summit, themed “Integrated Innovation · Leading Industrial Convergence,” was held at the Chengdu Tianfu International Convention Center.

The three-day conference brought together representatives from government, industry, academia, research, healthcare, and investment sectors across China. They shared their insights on market conditions, investment hotspots, and industrial transformation in seven key areas: digital health, AI- and computation-driven drug discovery, primary care, payment innovation, genetic testing, traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) wellness, and smart elderly care. Their perspectives offered multidimensional approaches to advancing the digital transformation of healthcare.

Unlike last year’s conference theme of “Distributed Innovation,” this year’s theme is “Integrated Innovation.” This shift in theme reflects, to some extent, the current trends in industry development.

Driven by policy, economic, and technological forces as core drivers, the development models and industrial elements within today’s broader health ecosystem have become significantly more diversified compared to the past.However, as the industry matures, the “distributed innovation” model—characterized by isolated innovations and incremental breakthroughs that previously upgraded and reshaped the healthcare sector—is transitioning toward an “integrated innovation” approach centered on convergence and collaborative development.

At the opening ceremony, Qi Xuchun, former Vice Chairperson of the 12th National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference and former Executive Vice Chairperson of the Central Committee of the Revolutionary Committee of the Chinese Kuomintang, pointed out:“With the deepening of the new healthcare reform, the continued advancement of the Healthy China 2030 Plan, and the state’s advocacy for the dual-circulation development of the health industry, China’s health industry is entering a new phase characterized by transition, acceleration, and the coexistence of challenges and opportunities. To transform China’s health industry, it is essential to shift away from traditional mindsets and competitive models, fostering mutual benefit through symbiosis and promoting development through integration.”

Taking the collaboration between innovative pharmaceutical companies and disease screening firms as an example, this partnership model not only enables companies to benefit by identifying more potential patients for their medications, but also allows patients to engage in continuous off-site disease management and self-care through such industrial cooperation.

In this process, not only pharmaceutical companies but also medical device companies, digital health firms, genetic testing enterprises, and innovative payment companies can all serve as integrators of industry resources. It is believed that integrated innovation should foster an innovation ecosystem network truly oriented toward the public’s health needs.

As stated by Wang Bin, President of EqualOcean,The broader health industry must not operate in isolation; only through integrated development can it secure a promising future. Meanwhile, the outcomes of industrial innovation must ultimately rest on coordination, collaboration, and partnership. Only through “integration” can we strengthen inter-industry convergence and achieve truly distinctive innovative breakthroughs.

At this critical juncture of digital transformation in healthcare, “innovation” has become an unavoidable imperative; however, homogenized innovation is bound to undergo a new round of reshuffling in the future.

It is precisely for this reason that the industry should clarify its approach to addressing key questions, such as how to innovate in the future and in which direction innovation should proceed. What can be clearly perceived, however, is thatWhether it is the integrated development of technologies such as 5G, the Internet of Things (IoT), blockchain, and artificial intelligence with healthcare, or the mutual collaboration among industries, both have become important pathways for driving innovative breakthroughs in today’s healthcare sector.

“Patient-centricity” was another frequently mentioned buzzword at the conference.

In fact, in the current process of medical digitalization, the industry’s focus has shifted from being institution-centric to patient-centric. Driven by market changes and policy guidance, the established rules across the upstream, midstream, and downstream segments of the industrial chain have been disrupted. Propelled by technological advancements, the pathways for enterprises to connect with patients are gradually shortening, while personalized medicine and precision medicine are on the rise, making the patient-centric development strategy increasingly clear.

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Wang Dongyuan remarked that the future direction of medical services must be centered on delivering value to patients. She further emphasized that, for enterprises, providing whole-lifecycle health management services is more critical than merely offering medical care. JD Health has established a health management ecosystem that is supply-chain-centric, leverages medical services as a key driver, and is powered by digital technology, covering all scenarios and the entire lifecycle. With value at its core, the company is piloting regional “Healthy City” initiatives aimed at achieving interconnectivity among hospitals within these regions. By progressing from points to lines and then to planes, it is gradually building a comprehensive big health ecosystem.

Moreover, Wang Dongyuan also discussed the value of focusing on patients.She believes that, in the realm of regional healthcare, it is crucial to serve the government by establishing a big data platform for medical and health information to create residents’ daily health records. Such a platform can also generate value for technological research and application expansion. For instance, it can help physicians develop more personalized treatment plans for patients, assist hospitals in making intelligent management decisions, serve as a foundation for continuous corporate innovation, and, to some extent, provide an evidence base for policy formulation. It delivers value to all stakeholders involved.

JD Health’s innovations in the smart hospital model are commendable, but beneath this model, technological support remains essential.

Zeng Lianghuai, Director of the Health and Medical Big Data Office at the Statistical Information Center of the National Health Commission, discussed key points in the development of smart hospitals:“With the continuous advancement of hospital informatization, digital and smart transformation has become the direction of hospital development. Against the backdrop of vigorous growth and application in the field of green and healthy healthcare, embracing next-generation information technologies to achieve data-driven, platform-based, and intelligent operations, and leveraging new technologies to integrate multiple systems manually, has become a key focus in the construction of smart hospitals.”

Currently, the applications of artificial intelligence and big data have covered numerous scenarios, including disease screening, assisted diagnosis, application management, pharmaceutical marketing, and health management. These advancements are, to a certain extent, helping to improve the efficiency of medical services and optimize resource integration, thereby alleviating the imbalance between the supply and demand of medical resources and services in China.

Liu Shiyuan, an expert in the field of medical imaging AI and Director of the Department of Medical Imaging and Medical Science at Changzheng Hospital,Common Pitfalls in the R&D of AI-Based Medical Imaging Products and Preventive Measures: Recommendations for Corporate Development“Selecting the right product entry point is critical. Companies must develop their own flagship products and clearly define their strategic direction. Enterprises should adopt a backward-design approach, starting with the end goal in mind: ultimately, the focus must be on clinical scenarios. We need to determine what kind of products are required—specifically, what patients need and what clinicians need. Therefore, when choosing a product development direction, the first step for companies is to immerse themselves in clinical practice to thoroughly understand clinical problems and workflows.”

Driven by AI and big data, genetic testing technology is also advancing rapidly. As the foundation and support for precision medicine and precision health management, genetic testing technologies are widely applied across various subfields of life sciences, making their development crucial to the future of human health. Today, the genetic testing market continues to expand alongside industrial growth.

At the meeting, Liu Zhaofeng, Director of the Health Service Industry Development Division of the Chengdu Municipal Health Commission, stated:“With the rapid advancement of gene sequencing technology, the time and cost required for single-person genome sequencing have been decreasing at a rate surpassing Moore’s Law. Meanwhile, gene testing technologies have been widely applied across various subfields of life sciences. Driven by favorable policies, an untapped market, and continuous technological iterations, the entire gene testing industry has ushered in a significant opportunity for development.”

If smart hospitals address the era’s essential demands in healthcare, then smart elderly care represents a targeted breakthrough addressing vulnerabilities beyond those core needs.

The seventh national census in 2021 showed that China's elderly population (aged 60 and above) had reached 260 million, an increase of 5.44% compared to 2010, indicating a significant acceleration in the aging process. Amid this trend, the "silver economy" and "healthcare and wellness market" have suddenly emerged; however, China still faces prominent issues such as lagging development of elderly care institutions and insufficient service capacity.

Chen Daqing, Deputy Director of the Elderly Care Committee under the China Household Services Association, has outlined five key issues that should be prioritized in the current development of the technology-driven elderly care industry.

First, product offerings are undiversified and lack intelligence. Currently, most projects focus primarily on a few functions, such as health monitoring and management, positioning and alerting, telemedicine, and information management for elderly care institutions. There are relatively few products that directly provide daily living and caregiving assistance, as well as emotional support, to older adults. Furthermore, there remain deficiencies in the utilization and integration of emerging technologies such as big data and artificial intelligence.

Second, products are smart but not age-friendly. The development of existing smart elderly care products in China is mostly based on general technologies, while basic research targeting the special needs of the elderly is severely lacking.

Third, the product is misaligned with development.

Fourth, the subsequent operation of various service management and service resource matching platforms related to smart elderly care services has been less than ideal, lacking mature business models and sustainability.

Fifth, insufficient data mining and sharing fail to accurately reflect the needs of the elderly.

Meanwhile, Chen Daqing pointed out that elderly life is diverse, and product development should focus on the inconveniences seniors face in their daily lives, as well as limitations such as declining physical functions. Meeting the genuine needs of the elderly is the core of developing smart elder care.

Looking back at the entire conference, how to leverage digital technologies to boost industrial development has become a critical issue for the healthcare industry today. There is no end to the innovation of digital concepts; industries should identify the right direction for digital transformation and continuously adjust their strategies in keeping with the times.

Currently, integrated innovation has become a significant trend. Efficient and rational allocation of industry resources with patients at the core may well be the focal point and significance of digital transformation.

As,As stated by Jin Xiaotao, former Member of the Party Leadership Group and Deputy Director of the National Health and Family Planning Commission, and President of the Chinese Society for Health Informatics and Medical Big Data, in his keynote address at the conference“Health is the one; everything else is merely the zeros that follow. The multifaceted, multi-perspective, and multifunctional health needs of the public require us to deliver solutions driven by integrated innovation.”

Accelerating integrated innovation, convergent innovation, and collaborative innovation is the inevitable path for the upgrading and accelerated development of the big health industry.