Technology and how it has improved the insurance industry was one of the issues highlighted at the just concluded 40th Annual Caribbean Insurance Conference, held in the Bahamas from June 5-7, 2022. CEO of Advanced Integrated Systems, Doug Halsall, who was a special guest at the event, presented on the topic: Health Insurance Trends in the Caribbean.
Not many Caribbean islands have invested in digitised healthcare. The information on this is scanty at best. There are, of course, private health facilities that have been using technology as part of healthcare management for years, but from a national perspective, nothing much has been happening on that front. Jamaica is not the only country in this hemisphere lagging behind. I believe Barbados is among the very few in the Caribbean region that has truly taken on digital transformation of healthcare and has been acting on it at an acceptable pace.
ANYONE WHO has been sick and has had to take medicines for whatever reason knows that pharmaceuticals can be quite expensive.
The pharmaceutical industry worldwide is a US multibillion dollar one. Each year the Jamaican Government spends in excess of $8 billion to provide pharmaceuticals to public-sector patients through hospitals, health centres and the National Health Fund (NHF).
The Caribbean’s leading health technology company, Advanced Integrated Systems (AIS) aims to improve the quality of healthcare through telemedicine.
AIS have already rolled out technology that will transform Jamaica into a country with the most comprehensive health information database, making telemedicine an easy transition. Telemedicine is the use of telecommunication and information technology to provide clinical health care from a distance.
Health is by far one of the most important assets we can have as individuals. If we do not have good health, we pretty much have nothing.
Mahatma Gandhi rightfully stated, "It is health that is real wealth and not pieces of gold and silver."
The prevalence of non-communicable diseases such as cancer, heart disease, diabetes and high blood pressure, and the effect they have had on the population not just in Jamaica but worldwide, signals to us that we need a revolution in health to arrest this problem.
Information technology company Advanced Integrated Systems (AIS) says its mobile money platform should go live in the next three months.
National Commercial Bank Jamaica is expected to be the first to roll out products and services through the platform, says Doug Halsall, chairman and CEO of AIS, but adds that they have three other financial service providers lined up as clients.
October 21, 2022
Health information technology is critical to the success of healthcare financing, according to Director of Health Applications at Advanced Integrated Systems, Shekar Sanumpudi.
Mr. Sanumpudi was speaking at the 14th annual Caribbean Conference on National Health Financing Initiatives, held in Antigua and Barbuda, from October 19-21, 2022.
The conference is being held under the theme “Confronting the Financial Challenges of COVID-19 and the Unfinished Universal Coverage Agenda.”
