Domestic Care & Design

Different trends in healthcare revolve around the role of home care, which will provide lower costs and better results in terms of a patient’s overall health and well-being.

In fact, many hospitals, in response to the increasing saturation of their respective structures dictated by the pandemic, have moved the care of patients with less complex and chronic illnesses to their homes. The Home Care Market is growing and is expected to reach $486.1 billion in 2026.

The new model especially responds to the needs of the Silver Generation by implementing anti-falling robot programs or robots for physiotherapy, as well as modern devices for remote monitoring and remote rehabilitation of cardiac, pulmonary, and neuro-degenerative diseases.

This new Home Care trend responds to the needs of different patients, and not just the elderly. Think of remote monitoring or telemedicine with procedures increasingly performed at home, such as pulse oximetry, infusion therapy, electrocardiogram, and radiography services.

The whole paradigm of care delivery is also changing. In the coming years, smart hospitals will accelerate. These are hospitals with new technologies and solutions to improve the patient experience.

Artificial intelligence applied to the healthcare market will increase with a CAGR (compound annual growth rate)of 46.2%, going up to $67.4 billion by 2027. Investors are also starting to favor venture capital financing for digital healthcare solutions. The Average Deal Size went from $20M in 2019 to $39M in 2021, as well as the size of the fund, nearly doubling to $14.7M over the same period.

The transformation will lead to a decentralized health service, in other words, real Smart Hospitals or Smart HealthCare Facilities.

In Italy, the NPRR has allocated €7 billion to achieve the objectives of Digital Health so that, even with local healthcare, the home becomes the first place of care. Robots have entered the healthcare system, from surgery to rehabilitation, and exoskeletons help carry out everyday actions.

Particular attention will be paid to the intuitiveness, safety, and ease of use of the new technologies capable of monitoring the patient's progress remotely. The role of design is fundamental in identifying and adapting medical and rehabilitation equipment for home use. In fact, designers have the responsibility of identifying multiple solutions to treat patients in the most pleasant and familiar environment: their home.