The high-acuity cluster is the fastest-growing area of the hospital. Already representing up to 60 percent of US hospital’s costs and revenues, high-acuity care is expected to only grow further as the “baby boomers” become senior citizens. The following article helps navigate the trends of monitoring systems for patients with acute life threatening conditions. Understand who are the key market players and what are the latest trends in this technology.

Introduction

High acuity areas are those where patients with various acute life threatening conditions are monitored and treated with utmost caution. The high-acuity cluster includes the emergency department (ED), the operating room (OR), and the intensive care units (ICU). Monitoring equipment in these areas is composed of electrobiomedical devices that conduct continuous or pulsed measurement of patients’ vital signs and other parameters as a diagnostic representation of patients’ well being. These monitoring systems are fitted with alarm functions, which are activated when the parameters for the patient are outside the “safe range” configured for that particular parameter setting.

Market Overview

Patient monitoring systems, especially those in the high acuity areas are very well developed and have become an indispensable part of all hospitals in Europe. The awareness among medical professionals of these systems coupled with the increasing incidence of diseases has driven the market for these systems. Despite certain segments expecting high growth rates, the patient monitoring systems markets as such are in the mature phase characterised by high replacement rates of systems and low volumes of equipment sales. As a result of high replacement rates, more importance is being placed on maintenance and service of these systems.

Market Segmentation

Apart from the segmentation schematically represented above, the High aquity areas monitoring systems can also be classified into

  • Vital sign monitors
  • The multi-parameter monitors

The vital sign monitors are those that are usually termed as the lower end multi-parameter monitors which monitors the vital signs; temperature, blood pressure, oxygen saturation, respiratory rate and heart rate. These monitors can be typically found in the non-critical care centers like the high dependency wards and other special wards.

Multi-parameter monitors are those that record and display these vital signs as well as other additional parameters such as invasive pressures, cardiac output, cerebrospinal fluid pressure, intra cranial pressure, ECG.

Key Players

The high acuity market is currently being led by GE Medical, Siemens Medical and Philips Medical Systems with a formidable combination of brand equity and longevity. These three have a combined market share of about 65% with Mindray, Spacelabs Healthcare, Nihon Kohden, and Welch Allyn well represented as well. Different participants follow different sales policies. Bigger players like GE Medical, Siemens Medical and Philips Medical Systems have a well established direct sales force bringing the products directly into the market. Other players often market their products through their dealers and distributors.

Fig 2. Market share split among top participants

Technology Trends

Technology is playing an increasingly important role in the improved delivery of healthcare. Hospitals have started making a concentrated effort to improve resource management, to streamline diagnostic and monitoring procedures and to optimise storage of information. Advancements in technology have enabled multiple parameters being displayed on the same monitor and a single monitor being able to display information simultaneously from several patients. Increasing adoption of wireless networks in hospitals has significantly reduced the clutter of wires in the ICU. These monitors provide alarm notifications under critical circumstances or emergency situations and also display important patient parameters.

Another important trend in this segment is connectivity of these monitors with the hospital information systems network to enable transfer of patient information. The latest systems used provide connection to the Web server and are HL7 compatible, thus enabling easy transfer of information. As this is happening in several major countries across Europe and North America, there is an increasing use of information systems in the healthcare industry. Furthermore, easy connectivity of these monitors to the hospital network is a significant factor in the adoption of these systems.

The participants see their end-user groups to be

  • Hospitals
  • Physicians
  • Nurses
  • Other Technicians
  • ICU’s &
  • Other High Acuity areas.

High Acuity Areas Monitoring Systems, today and tomorrow

The high acuity areas monitoring systems market as such is a saturated market mainly due to low replacement rate among certain segments. The market in the Eastern Europe is trying to catch up with that of the Western Europe in terms of its growth. Eastern European high acuity areas market is to a large extent affected by the entry of local participants and participants from the Asia Pacific, China and Korea. This trend has been a driving force for this market and will continue to be so in future.

Thus the High Acuity areas monitoring systems market in the Eastern Europe has a combination of established, local vendors in the respective countries and vendors from the Asia Pacific and others regions. The market is growing and is expected to grow at a reasonably good rate creating stiff competition even among the giants.

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Related November 2008


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