Four things to know:
1. The healthcare industry will likely spend $20 billion annually on health trackers and remote patient monitoring devices by 2023. Assistive “hearables,” such as connected hearing aids, are forecasted to generate more than $40 billion in revenue in the same period. Together, healthcare spending in the wearables market is slated to reach $60 billion by 2023, according to the report.
2. Some of the trends driving the uptick in wearables spending are improvements to remote patient monitoring technology, including advancements in artificial intelligence that can use data obtained by wearables to proactively check if a patient’s condition is worsening. Armed with this improved accuracy, medical institutions and regulators have become more confident in the technology.
3. Equipment manufacturers will need to adjust their business models as wearables become integrated into treatment plans, for example, by selling data procured by wearable devices to insurance providers. Services revenue associated with this type of data selling will hit an estimated $855 million by 2023, according to the report.
4. Data privacy and user consent will be the primary barriers to business models involving wearables that collect data.
“It is vital that patients are made aware of how their personal data will be used,” market analyst and report author Michael Larner said in a news release. “If not, making wearables a ‘must have’ to provide personalized care or receive medical insurance risks a backlash from patients and heightened regulatory scrutiny, stalling the effectiveness of remote monitoring.”
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