• In South Korea, 68% of people use fitness watches and other mobile application health trackers.
  • About 60% believe digital healthcare is already mainstream in South Korea.
  • Almost half of the population (45%) are willing to ‘somewhat likely’ use a digital app recommended by their doctor.

The COVID-19 pandemic sped up digital adoption across industries, and healthcare is not an exemption. For instance, when most of people were obliged to stay at home, doctors made themselves available for consultations via digital platforms. Along with the communication platforms, many tech companies and healthcare institutions are branching out to creating digital health products to better support people’s well-being.

Many are utilizing the smartphone as a health tool as well. From fitness trackers that can monitor hours of your sleep, your heart rate, and steps to an application that will simply remind you to drink water. All these projects tried to make use of smart applications to safeguard one’s health.

South Korea, known to be big adopters of technology innovations, has been the study’s base country. Real Research tried to measure the trust level for digital healthcare products in general, in South Korea. As many of the advancements may be overwhelming or entirely alien to others, the question of trust still matters. Also, to know whether the residents of Korea will see healthcare devices comparable to health professionals.

Digital Healthcare Exposure

More and more people are actually taking advantage of smart health products and technology. Almost half and a quarter (68%) admitted to using fitness watches and other health mobile applications. Significantly higher than those who said they don’t (33%).

As for digital health platforms, the majority of people were not convinced by the efficiency of the service (37%), followed closely by respondents’ concerns regarding privacy and data security (35%). Meanwhile, others are more traditional when it comes to healthcare and still prefer experts like doctors and nurses for consultation and monitoring examinations.

what do you think of using digital health platform for consultation

Also, when asked whether digital tools are more efficient than analog healthcare tools, most of the respondents agreed (57%). Meanwhile, others admitted ignorance by saying ‘i don’t know (32%), and some disagreed (11%).

As an overall awareness conclusion, more than half of respondents were into wearable health technologies and smartphone apps. However, when it comes to technology that provides consultation services online, it does not yet gain the majority’s trust and approval.

Digital Healthcare: The Future is Here

Based on the survey, virtual healthcare is already present and mainstream. In a poll, asking if respondents think virtual healthcare is yet to become mainstream, more than half believe digital healthcare is generally known and answered ‘no’ (60%).

For most of the respondents, digital healthcare is already existent and widely used in South Korea. This is no doubt possible, as they are one of the technologically-advanced countries in the world.

On the other hand, some of the respondents believe that digital healthcare still needs more push for wider adoption and answered ‘yes’ (40%).

do you think virtual healthcare is yet to become mainstream

People also expressed openness to the concept of digital doctors. The majority (68%) are open to ideas as long as the digital doctor is backed-up by a reliable underlying technology such as big data and artificial intelligence (AI). Then, they can trust digital doctors to give better consultations and check-ups in the future efficiently.

Surprisingly, less than a quarter (17%) believe that machines are far superior to human beings in carrying health diagnostics. While about 12% of the sample population still confides in the human interaction between patients and medical professionals in check-ups and examinations.

Yet again, healthcare application developers should be encouraged.  As with healthcare professionals’ right recommendation, the health application sees a good rate of adoption and downloads.

About half of the respondents were optimistic about using a digital health app recommended by their doctor, with responses stating ‘somewhat likely’ (45%) and ‘most likely’ (19%) to use. Some are unsure about it and answered ‘maybe’ (25%).

This poll again supports the finding that people are giving attention to digital apps, including those that can be paired with wearable devices. In conclusion, the digital healthcare outlook is bright; and South Korea proves to be a good market.

Methodology

Insights derived from Real Research’s “Digital Health Trust Survey” fielded in November 2020 to 1000 respondents of all genders, aged 34 to 59 in South Korea.