⚕️Digital Public Infrastructure approach to Healthcare

Healthcare is inherently complex, comprising an intricate web of needs, solutions, and stakeholders all aimed at one goal: Universal Health Coverage (UHC). The journey towards digitization in healthcare, which gained momentum in the 1990s with the adoption of electronic medical records, has showcased significant benefits but also highlighted substantial challenges.

The landscape of healthcare is vastly diverse, shaped by geographical, socioeconomic, and demographic factors. This diversity demands tailored approaches—whether addressing chronic lifestyle diseases or managing outbreaks of infectious diseases. While some nations have robust public healthcare systems, others rely heavily on private sectors, or a mix of both, often supported by global aid and development partners.

Innovation is relentless in healthcare. Advances in medical science, from gene therapy to artificial intelligence (AI), are revolutionizing treatments and patient care. Technologies like AI are personalizing healthcare, IoT devices are enhancing real-time monitoring, and 3D printing is transforming prosthetics and surgical procedures. These innovations are shifting healthcare from a traditional patient-care model to a more efficient, individualized care-patient model, facilitated by microdevices and edge computing.

However, the current efforts are fragmented. The high cost of coordination and the redundancy of efforts across systems result in inefficiencies and barriers to effective healthcare delivery. Hospitals and healthcare schemes often operate in isolation, each developing unique patient ID systems and digital solutions, which hampers the portability of health records and integration across different platforms.

To address these challenges, a paradigm shift is necessary—a shift towards a Digital Public Infrastructure (DPI) approach. This model proposes a minimalist yet robust infrastructure underpinned by sound governance models, enabling diverse market players—both public and private—to innovate and scale solutions effectively. By establishing shared standards and interoperable systems, DPI can eliminate the repetition of efforts, lower costs, and trigger positive flywheel effects via serendipitous innovations that will take us closer to UHC.

Read more about the digital public infrastructure approach here.

The next series of blogs detail what are the few reusable blocks that can spur inclusive innovation in healthcare. It is also important to note that the blocks can only be considered as DPI if they are built per the technical architecture principles .