Smart Healthcare

Portable ultrasound technology offers unique advantages in medical diagnostics, making it an indispensable part of modern medicine. Its compact size and reasonable price facilitate real-time testing in various settings, leading to its widespread application in emergency care, clinical diagnosis, and mobile healthcare. Taiwanese electronics companies such as Compal and ASUS are leveraging their core technologies to cultivate this field, launching products compliant with TFDA/FDA standards and competing with world-class products in the market. The introduction of AI technology can accelerate testing, improve the accuracy of image analysis, and provide more comprehensive patient information, assisting in medical decision-making. Taiwanese companies are integrating AI into ultrasound equipment to achieve intelligent analysis, automated testing, and personalized treatment, further enhancing its practicality and value.

Taiwan's smart healthcare industry has become a nationwide phenomenon, with hospitals at all levels actively pursuing smart technology, and the industry viewing medical technology as a crucial area of innovation. The government has introduced smart healthcare policies, and the capital market has seen the emergence of listed smart healthcare companies. However, it faces challenges such as a limited market, insufficient payment flexibility, and oversupply. The pandemic has increased consensus on smart healthcare, providing an opportunity to address core issues, such as increasing the proportion of healthcare in GDP. The challenges facing the smart healthcare industry are similar to those of other industries' digitalization development, but it should leverage its high level of consensus and abundant human resources to quickly develop solutions and find the right path for Taiwan to develop into a digital and artificial intelligence nation.

Smart healthcare offers significant benefits but is also costly, with the burden of payment yet to be clearly defined. Hospitals benefit from technological innovation but face limited budgets; healthcare insurance bears a heavy burden and is constrained by resources. Government funding or encouragement of private investment in smart healthcare could potentially address this. Multi-party collaboration is needed to improve healthcare efficiency and enhance public health. Finding a balance is crucial to finding feasible solutions for smart healthcare.

Generative AI applications are rapidly emerging, but privacy and ethical issues must be carefully addressed to ensure trustworthy applications. Regulatory frameworks are gradually emerging, emphasizing trustworthy AI. Caution is needed regarding training, data, and computing power to ensure legality and privacy. Trustworthy AI is key to digital transformation.

This article discusses the current status and challenges of digital healthcare development in Taiwan and offers suggestions. Taiwan's healthcare information industry is relatively small, with large hospitals mostly developing their own healthcare information systems. The technology of these existing systems is gradually falling behind cloud-based software architectures. Furthermore, the percentage of software talent invested in healthcare information over the past decade has been very low, hindering the realization of the digital healthcare aspirations of the nation. However, the Ministry of Health and Welfare began planning a next-generation healthcare information system last year, with a planned large budget to address the outdated architecture of Taiwan's current healthcare information systems. The author proposes that this is an opportune time to restructure Taiwan's healthcare information industry, encouraging large hospitals to gradually shift towards purchasing high-quality products and actively fostering large, internationally-capable flagship healthcare information companies that can provide reliable and highly scalable healthcare information solutions, possess integrated comprehensive patient data, interface with international data standards, export to overseas markets, and establish an application ecosystem. Ultimately, Taiwan's healthcare information infrastructure can connect with the international market, potentially attracting top-tier digital software talent to continue investing in the field.