Walid Hallassou, Vice President, Healthcare MENA, Huma Therapeutics, tells HW Editor Sarah Cartledge why there has never been a better time to embrace digital health
Digital technology played a significant role in the hugely successful football World Cup hosted by Qatar a few weeks ago. Not only in the emotive VAR decisions but also in providing rapid player analytics, crowd metrics, underpinning security, media streaming and visible sponsorship. The tournament reflected the extent to which the region has embraced digital technology for sport and entertainment and the same is happening in the healthcare sector too.
Working smart
According to a McKinsey & Co report from January 2023, the degree of digital penetration among Middle East consumers over the previous six months is equal to that of leading European and North American countries. Within digital devices, Middle East users overwhelmingly favour mobile apps as their preferred channel. An earlier McKinsey & Co report also states that smartphone penetration rates in the UAE and Saudi Arabia (KSA), where more than 65 per cent of the population is under 30 years of age, are among the world’s highest at around 93 per cent. This smartphone landscape provides the optimal setting for Huma’s digital platform.
Huma has worked in the Middle East since 2021. The company signed its first agreement with Mediclinic Middle East in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and together they provided the Abu Dhabi Department of Health with the digital tools to care for high-risk patients during the COVID-19 pandemic in an approach known as Remote Patient Monitoring (RPM).
“Most people in the region have mobile phones,” says Walid Hallassou, Huma’s Commercial Vice President for Healthcare in the Middle East and Northern Africa. “Our platforms use the patient’s mobile phone, wearable devices and other sensors to provide doctors with a stream of data on their health. The data enables healthcare teams to monitor patients’ evolving symptoms, advise on what care is required and alert them to when a visit from a clinician or hospital admission is needed.”
Being able to monitor a patient’s health and disease indicators from the comfort of their own home is particularly attractive for chronic non-communicable diseases (NCD) such as heart disease and diabetes, which are on the rise in some Middle East countries. For example, NCDs are now responsible for 73 per cent of all deaths in KSA. Taking measurements via RPM not only means that patients are spared unnecessary visits to a clinic, but that clinician time is better managed by seeing only those patients whose measurements require in-person assessment.
“Instead of building more clinics or hospitals, we can match patients with a platform to help them while they are at home, at work, or even travelling, because collecting information can happen from anywhere,” explains Walid. “A diabetic patient, for example, is prompted by our app to take their blood glucose every morning, to record weight every week and to answer questionnaires. Maybe every month they have a reminder to go and see a doctor but, instead of doing the majority of assessments physically, we’re taking everything we can onto the digital space. This limits burdensome clinic visits and evidence shows that it helps patients stay compliant with a treatment plan.
Crafting a new digital landscape
Developing new solutions to tackle NCD is one of the priorities of KSA’s Vision 2030. A new Health and Wellness RDI (research, development, and innovation) will be announced later this year with countrywide aspirations stretching over the next two decades. The RDI will include a focus on disruptive digital healthcare, health equity, and cutting edge biotech/pharmaceutical technologies.
“There are huge challenges that come with any major transformation,” says Walid. “Vision 2030 divides the Ministry of Health into three different organisations that are completely independent. At Huma, we see it as a great opportunity to be part of these reforms and we are currently talking to the Ministry to understand how our experience might help them in the design of an optimal digital roadmap to serve healthcare requirements.”
Established in 2011, Huma has long-standing experience in the field. Its award-winning digital-first platforms support a global network of patients, reaching more than 27m people via more than 3,000 hospitals and clinics. With 90-95 per cent patient adherence rates, Huma has demonstrated that its digital platform can double clinical capacity and reduce hospital readmission rates.
Evidence reinforces value
Huma is well-equipped to operate in an environment where insurers must be persuaded of the value of an intervention because its digital platform is underpinned by robust clinical and scientific research publications and its scientists have contributed to more than 50 peer-reviewed studies to-date. Its most recent scientific study, in collaboration with a department from the University of Cambridge, UK, provides evidence for the high engagement and long-term retention of participants with Huma’s app-based monitoring system. This is because Huma understands people. Its platform has been built on a deep clinical knowledge of complex patient needs and how people engage with technology
Importantly, Huma’s platform is modular and therefore highly flexible, enabling partners to rapidly configure some of the most complex digital health solutions. “We pride ourselves on being agnostic,” says Walid. “Our platform is agnostic to diseases, agnostic to devices, agnostic to clouds and agnostic to hospital or clinical information systems. For example, there are many good organisations that have a great app to monitor diabetes, hypertension or multiple sclerosis, but Huma has created a digital tool whereby the clinician can configure any disease. The advantage is that one tool can manage a population that has comorbidities or a range of diseases. Our solution is also cloud agnostic too, which means that patient data can stay hosted within the user’s system.”
Clinical research advances care
Healthcare systems with active clinical research programmes have better patient care outcomes. In January, Huma announced that it has acquired Alcedis GmbH, a market-leader for data driven clinical research and technology. Through the acquisition, Huma is forming an advanced clinical trials division offering digital solutions across the entire clinical development pipeline, from early stage trials through to Phase IV hybrid and fully decentralised, or virtual, trials.
“Healthcare advances through clinical research and this evolution in Huma’s business model will redefine clinical trials,” says Walid. The company will now offer a one-stop shop for remote access, data, logistics and the execution of clinical trials with advanced digital technology.
World Cup Qatar 2022 was voted the ‘best World Cup this century’ in a survey by the BBC, amasssing 78 per cent votes. Just as it has set a new standard for possibility in World Cup football, there is an opportunity for the Middle East region to show what is achievable in the innovative application of digital technology to healthcare. For Walid, “Huma’s platform can be used in a variety of different ways, and we are excited to see how such a forward-looking region leverages it.”