The Internet of Things and the Australian Health Care and Insurance Industry - Essay Example

Internet of Things Name: Institution: Internet of Things Introduction The internet of Things (IoT) is considered as one of the most innovative disruptive technologies that has become a hotbed of technological teams seeking the development of an innovative and transformative society. This type of disruptive technology comprises a network of things, which provides a platform of information sharing among different players using sensors, network connectivity, and software that comprise of smart devices. In the organizational context, IoT is a strategy aimed at improving the nature of business on the global and Australian economic platform. According to Gartner, by 2020 there will be development in IoT enhanced by improved connectivity of more than 20 billion things globally (Manyika et al, 2011). The main objective of this essay is to assess how IoT, an innovative disruptive technology, will impact on the nature of work both globally and in the Australian context. The Australian health care The healthcare sector on the global and Australian platform is one of the sectors that will be greatly affected by IoT. This is because this sector will realize the most benefits by adopting IoT. This is related to ability of healthcare facilities to embrace Patient Generated Data (PGD). By embracing this approach to IoT, it will be possible for patients and their caregivers to engage in the generation, storage and sharing of essential health information. This will include patient reported outcomes and data generated from wearable hardware and medical devices (Manyika et al, 2011). According to Deloitte University Press, at a country level the healthcare industry in Australia will benefit from this method of data sharing because it will provide a technique of accumulating data from outside clinical settings. Internet of Things is considered as an essential innovation platform that provides techniques through which the struggling healthcare systems can become more effective. The inevitable changes that Internet of things will be able to provide are the procedures used in the generation, retrieval, storage, and management of data (Gilchrist, 2016). Within the healthcare sector, IoT will be crucial in improving the provision of healthcare services because it will provide healthcare practitioners and patients with enhanced techniques of approaching programs that impact on health. Real time health systems will be one of the major areas of implementation of IoT in healthcare. This is because within the Australian health care sector, Big Data Analytics processes and tools will be used in the evaluation of static and dynamic data for predictive analytics (Clarke & Steele, 2012). This is considered essential in improving healthcare because it will provide the global and the Australian health care systems with systems and platforms of refining the effectiveness and efficiency of patient care. Furthermore, through this approach of using IoT in healthcare it will be possible to combine cost saving and improved service provision as Internet of things evolves in healthcare (Manyika et al, 2011). According to studies conducted by KPMG, Australia, and the evolution of IoT will deliver more than 50 billion devices, which will have a $11 trillion annual impact on the global economy by 2025 (Perera et al, 2012). For the healthcare sector, this is considered as an indispensable transformation because it will reshape interaction techniques between the industry and technology. Patients in Australia and in the global context will become more proactive by being involved in their wellbeing (AIHW, 2011). Through IoT, it will be possible for patients to monitor, assess, report, and respond to their own symptoms. This will be essential in reducing the workload on medical practitioners hence enabling quicker and effective delivery of treatment. This approach to delivery of healthcare services will be made possible through the availability of home health technologies such as mobile apps and blood pressure monitors (Perera et al, 2012). IoT will be a revolutionary in the Australian health sector because it will allow patient suffering from chronic illnesses with improved techniques of monitoring their health status. Through connected devices, it will be possible to constantly track their conditions and provide timely reports to medical practitioners. For such patients, integration of IoT into healthcare will ensure that they get quicker responses and improved treatment with limited possibilities of increased instances of hospital admissions (Aberer et al, 2007). IoT will also facilitate collaboration within the healthcare sector. This is because the integration of healthcare activities with technology will make patient records more accessible making it possible for multiple healthcare organizations and professional to work towards the administration of the best possible care without manual transfer of data. IoT will provide healthcare providers with a platform of using technology in coordinating with one another to ensure the formulation of a precise and personalized treatment plan for patients hence improving on their health outcomes (Perera et al, 2012). IoT and the Australian insurance industry The efficiency and effectiveness of the Australian insurance industry is dependent on the ability of players within this industry to ensure that the products and pricing strategies are relevant in the realization of customer needs. IoT is an innovative technology that will ensure that matters of insurance are connected to the underwriting process. The IoT backed innovation that is envisioned to improve service provision at the in the Australian insurance industry is telematics. Telematics is a form of innovation that allows insurers to receive real-time assessment on drivers (Hassan, 2016). This helps in monitoring a number of things within the industry, which include rapid acceleration, speed, airbag deployment, distance driven, and sudden braking. These elements are considered vital in the insurance industry because they affect one’s premium. The ability of insurance companies to embrace IoT to monitor this information will allow for the development of strategies and programs aimed at offering and applying Usage based Insurance (UBI). UBI approach to the delivery of insurance premiums emanates from the United States with the objective of streamlining and maximizing on services and products offered by insurance companies (Evans, 2016). In Australia, this approach to insurance is considered instrumental because it will provide companies such as General Motors Assurance and Progressive Insurance with techniques on how to start setting their premium process based on data collection. Existing studies indicate that there has been massive increase in this approach to insurance., according a recent study about 37% of all auto insurance carriers on the global platform are expected to embrace telematics by 2025. Cars are considered as initiators of telematics, with the popularity and prevalence of IOT, the development of connected homes will become a common feature. Through this technological approach, it will be possible for insurers to use IoT in monitoring other objected that will continue to rise (Swan, 2012). Slow progress of the Australian insurance industry has led to limited growth in the ability of insurance companies to embrace telematics. With continued and advanced competition in the insurance space in Australia and the introduction of multinational insurance companies such as Progressive Insurance in Australia, insurers will be compelled to respond by embracing telematics as an essential competitive advantage tool. Inasmuch as IoT has been used in streaming communication and sharing information, the insurance sector in Australia has been slow in taking advantage of the innovation that comes with the deployment of IoT. The essence of this technology is that it provides the foundation for the concept of smart city, which provides a description on how social innovation can be used in encapsulating technology to ensure that it is applied in the creation of more efficient solutions for the community. Through this technological innovation, it becomes possible for the community (Hassan, 2016). The process of embracing IoT the healthcare and insurance industries in Australia mean that the management has the responsbility of ensuring that the technology is integrated in their operations. This will be enhanced by their ability to embrace the virtual reality, augmented reality, and artificial intelligence that characterizes the integration of this technology. The goal of the Australian and global healthcare and insurance organizations should be the development of techniques on how to adapt to IoT technology with the systems to enhance customers satisfaction and economic growth. This would involve training their personnel on how to use the technology in providing services to their clients. Embracing IoT will facilitate the creation of more customer-focused approaches to engaging and addressing the needs of clients. This approach to technology will also enhance the creation of substantial changes within Australia’s nationwide healthcare and insurance systems (Swan, 2012). Conclusion The internet of Things (IoT) is a type of disruptive technology that comprises a network of things, which provides a platform of information sharing among different players using sensors, network connectivity, and software that comprise of smart devices. In the insurance industry, telematics will play a vital role in enhancing service delivery. Telematics will allow insurers with techniques of receiving real-time assessment on drivers. This will helps in monitoring a number of things considered vital in the insurance industry because they affect one’s premium. In the healthcare sector, IoT will be crucial in improving the provision of healthcare services because it will provide healthcare practitioners and patients with enhanced techniques of approaching programs that impact on health. Real time health systems will be one of the major areas of implementation of IoT in healthcare. This is because within the Australian health care sector, Big Data Analytics processes and tools will be used in the evaluation of static and dynamic data for predictive analytics. References Aberer, K, Hauswirth, M and Salehi, A (2007), “Infrastructure for data processing in large-scale interconnected sensor net- works,” in International Conference on Mobile Data Management, pp. 198–205. AIHW (2011),“Biomedical Component of the Australian Health Survey: Public Health Objectives,” [Online]. Available:http://www.health.gov.au/internet/main/publishing.nsf/Content/health-pubhlth-strateg-food-monitoring.htm/$File/Biomedcal%20component%20AHS-public%20health%20objectives.pdf Clarke, A and Steele, R (2012). "Summarized Data to Achieve Population-Wide Anonymized Wellness Measures," En-gineering in Medicine and Biology Society (EMBC), 2012 Annual International Conference of the IEEE, pp. 2158-2161. Evans, P (2016). The Internet of Things, and insurance. Deloitte LLP Gilchrist, A. (2016). Industry 4.0: The industrial internet of things. Berkeley, CA: Apress. Hassan, Q. F. (2016). Innovative research and applications in next-generation high performance computing. Hershey : Information Science Reference Manyika, J, Chui, M Brown, B, Bughin, J, & Dobbs, J. (2011). “Big data: The next frontier for innovation, competition, and productivity, ”McKinsey Global Institute, Tech. Rep.http://www.mckinsey.com/Insights/MGI/Research/TechnologyandInnovation/BigdataThenextfrontierforinnovation Perera, C, Christen, P, Salehi, A & Georgakopoulos, D. (2012). “Capturing sensor data from mobile phones using global sensor network middleware,” in IEEE International Workshop on Internet-of-Things Communications and Networking 2012 (PIMRC 2012-Workshop-IoT-CN12), Sydney, Australia, Swan, M. (2012). “Sensor Mania! The Internet of Things, Weara-ble Computing, Objective Metrics, and the Quantified Self 2.0,” Journal of Sensor and Actuator Networks, Vol. 1, No. 3, pp. 217-253 Appendices Appendix 1 Figure 1.0 Growth in installation of telematics in cars Appendix 2 Figure 2.0 Telematics Update and the state of insurance industry is in considerable flux Appendix 3 Figure 3.0 Gartner's 2014 Hype Cycle for Disruptive Technologies Appendix 4 Figure 4.0 Estimates healthcare IoT device installation An increase in the cost of healthcare leads patients to demand for better care, this makes hospitals turn to disruptive technologies such as IoT Read More