Virtual health: An immediate solution or a distant dream?

Virtual health: An immediate solution or a distant dream?

Digital technology has made a reality what we could only have imagined a few years ago. For instance, the ease with which we are now able to access a medical expert and quality healthcare from anywhere in the world at any time of the day, or have a prescription refilled without ever having to have left the home or office. Today, virtual heath offers people access and convenience at home or on the go, from a computer or on a smartphone. It leverages technology and enables patients to view and share their medical records and test results with their doctors in real-time. It also allows them to track their immunisation status and manage medication lists, which helps improve engagement in care and treatment compliance. While technology has facilitated this evolution towards virtual health, medical institutions, health insurers, and consumers have been slower to embrace it than was anticipated. It took the Covid-19 pandemic to push the ecosystem into widespread adoption of virtual health services over the past year and a half. The shows that people in Saudi Arabia and the UAE are more likely than the global average to have used virtual health before and during the pandemic, with Saudis