Clément Pacaud, Managing Director of Visiomed, operator of the “Smart Salem” high-tech health centres in the Middle East, talks to European Scientist. The market is booming, with improvements in prevention, an ever-expanding sector and artificial intelligence.
The European Scientist : You are an expert in digital health and an operator of high-tech health centres in the Gulf region. These concepts are often misunderstood. How would you describe digital health?
Clément Pacaud : Digital health is built around the notion of the 5Ps, in the sense that it aims to be personalised, preventive, predictive, participatory and evidence-based. To achieve this, digital health is based on the extraction and analysis of data, which is truly the cornerstone of tomorrow’s health. Digital health promises to make the most of this data to guide healthcare decisions, therapeutic approaches and patient knowledge. A high-tech health centre is a practical application of digital health.
TES. : As an operator of high-tech health centres, you are just one link in the chain. Who are the main players?
C.P. : Digital or high-tech health is a concept that was first largely thought up at government level. No country, no hospital, no learned society does not see it as an essential asset for the medicine of tomorrow. In France, it is the subject of a strategic acceleration plan financed to the tune of €650 million, launched fairly recently. As for the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia, the development of digital health is widely encouraged by the public authorities, which place great emphasis on innovation in all areas of society.
However necessary it may be, the impetus provided by the public authorities is still insufficient: today, digital health is largely driven by a group of innovative “Medtech” players, research centres and hospitals or healthcare establishments that put it into practice every day. Studies suggest that the global digital health market could be worth around €240 billion. It’s a tremendous breeding ground for opportunity and innovation. Above all, it is already changing patients’ lives. In all areas of medicine, many digital tools have already been validated by the medical community and their effectiveness has been proven by studies.
TES. : What are the concrete benefits for patients?
C.P. : I can identify two: speed of execution and personalisation of the patient experience. In terms of the first, we demonstrate every day in our medical centres that the complete digitisation of procedures enables a significant reduction in waiting times, facilitating the logistical flow of patients, which is an advantage not only for our customers but also for our care staff. For the second, patients have their health data already digitised and can benefit from a range of tests tailored to their needs and requirements, whether it’s an administrative medical test (visa, driving licence, etc.) or a full health check-up. Looking more generally at digital health, it promises patients greater knowledge of their risk factors, their chances of developing certain diseases and the preventive methods they can use to avoid them. This is a clear advantage in terms of prolonging life in good health and limiting the onset of diseases, some of which represent a major social cost. So, quite logically, it is now a priority for the health authorities in many countries.
TES. : We often talk about the contribution of artificial intelligence to digital health, without really being able to identify its realities…
C.P. : Let’s not get the wrong perspective. Artificial intelligence is first and foremost a tool for healthcare professionals, not an end in itself. It is based on a dual approach. Firstly, it is quantitative, in the sense that it enables a very large amount of health data to be processed rapidly. It is also qualitative, in that it can detect things that human expertise alone may have difficulty identifying. Artificial intelligence in healthcare is already fully operational, as it is increasingly used in the healthcare and prevention strategies of public and private establishments around the world. I don’t think we’ll ever see the end of it – and that’s good news – because innovation in this field is a continuous process, with new contributions and potential arriving at regular intervals. You only have to go to a dedicated trade show to see how innovation moves at breakneck speed.
TES. : So we can assume that you are already using it?
C.P : AI is in fact already directly integrated within the Smart Salem medical centres, as we are currently using certain AI software to analyse X-rays in order to help doctors diagnose patients. It is also reflected in our development practices. We are constantly thinking about creating potential partnerships with Medtech players specialising in AI in healthcare or other technologies across a whole range of areas of expertise, such as mammography 2.0 to optimise breast cancer diagnosis, improving the identification of exposure to certain cancers using blood tests, or even laboratories offering genome tests to identify predisposition to certain diseases. Keeping our finger on the pulse of the Medtech innovation ecosystem should enable us to integrate, as far as possible, the best AI tools into our centres’ healthcare offering, so that we remain at the cutting edge of digital health.
When people ask me what the Smart Salem 2.0 centre should be, I reply that Smart Salem is already one. Our aim is to add bricks of innovation and services little by little. As soon as we identify an operational technology with evidence-based results that can meet a need, we can integrate it into our range of services. The Medtech ecosystem specialising in artificial intelligence is fantastic because it opens up a whole new world of possibilities in the medical field.
TES. : Can this high-tech healthcare model be applied elsewhere?
C.P. : The digital medical centre has its place everywhere in the world in that it promises faster and safer diagnosis. However, it needs to be adapted to the needs of public authorities or local populations. In the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia, the majority of our revenue is currently linked to administrative medical tests to obtain residence visas for expatriates. This is peculiar to a country where labour emigration is extremely high. We have identified more than 80 countries around the world, such as Australia, Canada and Singapore, which face similar needs due to the presence of large numbers of foreign workers. In the United Arab Emirates, administrative tests used to be carried out by public health centres that were struggling to keep up with demand, offering very long turnaround times – sometimes up to ten hours – between the patient’s arrival at the laboratory and their discharge, as well as delays of several days or even weeks for the processing of medical data and therefore the issuing of the visa. In a way, we have completed the offer and streamlined the process, with average times of just 5 minutes to carry out all the medical tests and less than half an hour to obtain the residence visa.
But the DNA of a high-tech health centre is above all its flexibility and adaptability. It can be designed to carry out complete check-ups in a preventive context to identify a patient’s risk factors, or integrated into a cancer centre. A high-tech health centre is first and foremost a set of tools designed to meet specific needs. When it comes to our future sites, we’ve made the decision not to restrict ourselves in any way. At the same time, we obviously want to strengthen our network of existing sites in the Gulf region in the future, because the region is growing fast and demand for our services is very strong.
TES. : But the United Arab Emirates seem to be particularly fertile ground…
C.P. : The quality and efficiency of the services provided in our centres are recognised by the local population and authorities, as demonstrated by our 2023 growth (with tests up 41% in 2023, which translates into 38% growth in sales compared with 2022). The authorities are promoting our services and have full confidence in us to carry out a mission that is highly strategic for them. Our IT system is directly integrated with that of the health authorities in the Emirate of Dubai, and we are in a true public-private partnership, which is the basis for a very long-term relationship based on trust.
You are right to describe the Emirates as fertile ground: the dematerialisation of administrative procedures, the digitisation of healthcare and, more broadly, innovation in the medical sector are all priorities in the country’s economic diversification plans. The same is true in Saudi Arabia, where we are in the process of setting up operations, and where our service offering is perfectly in line with the Vision 2030 plan currently being rolled out by the local authorities. You only have to take a quick look at the management of the Covid-19 pandemic to understand the extent to which innovative, digital health has become a priority in the Emirates and the Gulf in general. In the face of the disorganisation that prevailed in Europe, they deployed an impressive testing capacity and, in the end, had to reduce travel very little. In short, Visiomed can flourish in every way in this ecosystem.
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