A survey from Intel suggests that 57 percent of people worldwide believe hospitals will be obsolete at some point in the future. The survey of 12,000 people from eight countries, conducted in August, asked adults 18 and older a variety of questions about the personalization of healthcare, home health management, and sharing of health data.
In general, acceptance of personal monitoring in healthcare was high. More than 70 percent of people globally would be receptive the idea of health sensors built into a toilet, smart pill bottle caps or ingestible sensors. Personalized medicine, too, was positively received. Asked to choose between getting the same treatment as others with their symptoms and getting a customized treatment based on their genetic profile, 66 percent chose the latter option.
People were less quick to jump at the chance to put healthcare in their own hands with a tricorder-like device, but still reasonably receptive. While 53 percent said they would trust a test they administered themselves as much as or more than the same test performed by a doctor, only 30 percent would trust themselves to perform their own ultrasound. Forty-three percent trusted themselves to monitor their own basic vital signs like blood pressure.
Telehealth faired a little better than consumer health. In general, 72 percent of those surveyed were receptive to remotely communicating with a doctor. But only 50 percent would trust a diagnosis delivered via video conferencing. Intel said the least well-received innovation it asked about was robotically performed surgery.
People were moderately willing to share healthcare and medical data to improve innovation. They were more willing to anonymously share health records or genetic information than banking information or phone records, but less willing to share health data than email records, purchase history, or browsing history. However, answers changed when the question was asked as "How much more likely would you be to share this information if you knew it could lead to technology innovation that prolongs or improves someone’s quality of life?" For that question, healthcare categories caused the biggest jumps from the innovation version. If offered an incentive like lower medical costs, an additional 14 percent of low and middle income respondents were willing to share medical or health data.
Willingness to share medical information also broke down on demographic lines. Western countries like the US, France, and Italy, along with Japan, were least likely to share, while China, Indonesia, Brazil, and especially India were the most likely. A full 79 percent of Indians were willing to share health records and genetic information. China also broke with the pack in the area of genetic information, where Chinese respondents were more hesitant, actually scoring below the US and Italy. Globally, millenials were also less likely than people 55 and older to share results of lab tests or health monitoring -- 64 percent vs 76 percent.
Millenials in general were less bullish about technology than Intel expected, with 77 percent of US millenials agreeing with the statement "we rely on technology too much". They were more likely to say that technology makes us less human and less likely to agree that technological innovation was central to their nation's wellbeing.
