Nov 19
2020
Defining The Digital Therapeutics Landscape For Provider and Payers
Digital health aims at some of the biggest healthcare challenges, including lowering costs, fostering engagement and improving health outcomes. However, before achieving these goals, it must win over providers and payers to secure physician buy-in and reimbursement.
The first step is defining the digital therapeutics (DTx) landscape. There are so many new technologies hitting the healthcare scene that it can be hard to tease apart the differences.
Here’s what providers and patients need to know about digital therapeutics and how they can start holistically integrating the breakthroughs into the services they provide.
Digital therapeutics vs. digital health vs. telehealth
Nowadays, you often hear these terms used interchangeably. Indeed, there is a lot of overlap between them, but it is important to distinguish between them.
In a recent digital therapeutics services report , the health experts at Star Global defined the differences as the following. Digital health is the broadest category and refers to the use of digital technologies, including online platforms, wearable technologies, connectivity and sensors to enhance healthcare delivery efficiency. It’s focused on driving personalization and on-demand care.
Digital therapeutics are a subset of digital health. Digital therapeutics deliver evidence-based therapeutic interventions and refers to a broad swathe of products and services designed to address stakeholder needs across the healthcare ecosystem.
Most DTx products are patient-centric, but there are some like the AI virtual assistant and diagnostic toolkit Suki. By smoothing out the provider workflow, it creates more time and interaction for providers to have with patients.