Skyrocketing Technology-Based Therapeutic Strategy During Covid-19
- 1. Department of Pharmacy, Life Science Faculty, Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman Science and Technology University, Gopalganj (Dhaka)-8100, Bangladesh
Abstract
Technology-dependent therapeutic strategy has gained much attention during the coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19) pandemic worldwide. Besides many others, financial crisis, virus transmission fear, lockdown and hygienic rules and regulations, chance of getting comorbidity, physicians centered on Covid-19 patients, and hospitalization facilities are the major obstacles that limiting other patients to access to the required treatment facilities. Although the digital approaches are not a straightforward strategy, but proper control and management chain may be a landmark step in modern medical services, especially in low- and middle-income countries where fragile health management exists. This article highlighted the importance of skyrocketing technology-based therapeutic strategy during Covid-19, might be a hopeful therapeutic model in the modern health care system.
Citation
Islam MT (2020) Skyrocketing Technology-Based Therapeutic Strategy During Covid-19. Clin Res Infect Dis 5(1): 1056.
PERSPECTIVE
Technology-dependent therapeutic strategy has gained much attention during the current coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19) pandemic. The use of digital public health was started since 1854 when John Snow mapped to identify the Broad Street pump as a source of cholera in London [1]. Except Covid-19 patients in severe cases, in the current situation, access of almost all types of patients to physicians has been significantly reduced; the reasons behind this include - financial crisis, virus transmission fear, lockdown/hygienic obligations and change of obtaining comorbidity, physicians centered to Covid-19 patients, level of education or consciousness among the patients, and hospitalization facilities. The fragile health care management is becoming more prevalent, especially in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). Since ancient a significant amount of patients in LMICs has been using traditional medicines, even most of them have not yet been connected to the modern medical system. However, phytotherapists see this as an entrepreneurial path to the emergence and development of herbal medicines [2].
Digital approaches (such as email, mobile/telephone, and social media) can also play a significant role in public health; these can also provide data for communication with the public and effective decision makers. Covid-19 pandemic has been created a platform to explore digital health care facilities, which might be helpful in making public health prevention, surveillance, and response policies more effectively across the world with a wide range of challenges. Any country through collecting data in this way - (i) administrative may be used for medical needs, will be able to play a special role in the development of health management, (ii) will be possible to study the age, socio-economic and other factors of the people there on the basis of health conditions in the region, for example – the Black, Hispanic or Latino, and Native Americans are currently at the highest risk of infection and death from the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) in the USA [3], (iii) data collected from the unhealthy regions through this system may play a key role in predicting the source, type and subsequent hotspot of any epidemic, (iv) may keep a long-term record of any particular disease or future infection or epidemic and take appropriate action accordingly, (v) might be able to develop advanced technological supports that can play a significant role in health care and relevat areas, for an example - contact tracing systems are currently being used in China, South Korea, Singapore and some other countries, and adequate efforts are being made to innovate new technologies to make them more powerful, (vi) patients, public, administration, media, physicians, and other healthcare workers can get a direct and an effective platform in this way, which will play an important role in sharing their experience; will find appropriate approaches that might help their message reaching to the public rapidly, enabling them to take on timed challenges, (vii) digitization of case reports, priority selection and hospitalization, increased public awareness along with many other variables will be ensured in this way.
While the World Health Organization (WHO) recommended physician-to-population ratio is ignored, having a suitable prescription for the rich is just a matter of prescriber, opportunity and time, on the other hand, financial consistency is added to the list for the poor. Tele-prescription can play an important role in public and private health care management. Currently, in the situation of Covid-19, most of the mild to moderate non-Covid-19 patients in South Asian countries, including Bangladesh and India are receiving health care from the helpline (e.g., writing message, audio and video consultation). While this is not a straightforward approach, domestic health care systems (e.g., expert physicians, advanced and adequate phone calls and messaging and receiving systems) if seriously controlled, can lead to many benefits, including – (i) obtaining more health services from less physicians; (ii) avoiding overcrowding in healthcare centers, which might help us to avoid various contagious diseases, especially infectious diseases; (iii) reducing the movement hassle and cost of patients, the public and the medical team as a whole; (iv) reducing prescription time and cost, which will play a supportive role in diagnosing and treating patients in appropriate ways; (v) preserving patient data efficiently in a standard way; (vi) increase the time and scope of service of physicians and other medical workers for the seriously ill patients; (vii) reducing and even avoiding accomodation and allocation related costs and complications of other medical personnel, including physicians, from the health management system; and (vii) finally, reducing overall costs in the health sector of a country.
Several countries around the world are adopting stateof-the-art approaches to providing advanced medical care to patients, for example - USA, UK, Canada, South Africa, Australia and Scotland, in addition to physicians, are planning to use and even using pharmacist prescribers in their health care systems [4]. However, LMICs have not yet made any decision regarding this issue, although they have the opportunity to make such a decision. In addition, most of the LMICs still hold pharmacists in the pharmaceutical industry and their hospital pharmacy services are yet to start. For an example, pharmacy education in Bangladesh has been started since 1964, however, it does not introduce hospital pharmacy service yet. In the case of LMICs countries, skyrocketing therapeutic approaches might be a good strategy at present. In addition, it will be possible to take this approach one step further with the use of pharmacists, as this group has been able to establish a groundbreaking signature in prescription review and patient counseling in many countries in the world.
Poverty and inadequate prescription facilities due to fragile health management system are the two main consequences for patients’ self-medication practice, which provides potential risks, including inappropriate diagnosis, delays in seeking medical advice, mild to severe adverse reactions, drug interactions, administration difficulties, irrational drug therapy (i.e., incorrect selection of drug and dose, administration route and frequency, and patient), masking of a severe disease, and risk of drug dependence and abuse [5]. Taken together, the skyrocketing technology-based therapeutic approach could become a groundbreaking step not only in the Covid-19 crisis but also for ever in the modern health management.
