JMIR Publications

ABSTRACT

Background:

Over the last several decades, Vietnam has attained remarkable achievements in all areas of the healthcare system. However, shortcomings including health disparities persist. Besides, the country is undergoing a dramatic demographic transition with a steady growth of the population that is rapidly ageing. This has resulted in a shift in the disease burden from communicable to non-communicable diseases, such as dementia, cancer and diabetes. These medical conditions require long-term care that causes an accelerating crisis for the health sector and society. The current healthcare system in Vietnam is unlikely to cope with these challenges.

Objective:

The aim of this paper was to provide an analysis of the current healthcare situation in Vietnam and explore the opportunities and challenges in transforming toward a patient-centered care model to produce better health for people and reduce healthcare costs.

Methods:

We examine the applicability of a personalised and integrated healthcare system, known as Bespoke healthcare (BHS), for Vietnam using a Strength – Weakness – Opportunity – Threat (SWOT) analysis and examining the successes or failures of digital healthcare innovations in Vietnam. We then make suggestions for successful adoption of the BHS model in Vietnam.

Results:

Patient-centered care of the BHS empowers patients to become active participants in their own healthcare. Vietnam has tremendous potential and favorable policy, social, technological and economic environment for the transition of its healthcare system toward the BHS model. Nevertheless, the country is in an early stage of healthcare digitalisation. The legal and regulatory system to protect patient privacy and information security is still lacking. The readiness to implement electronic medical records – a core element of the BHS, varies across health providers and clinical practices. The scarcity of empirical evidence and evaluation regarding the effectiveness and sustainability of digital health initiatives is an obstacle for Vietnamese government in policymaking, development and implementation of healthcare digitalisation.

Conclusions:

Implementing personalised and integrated healthcare system may help Vietnam to address healthcare needs, reduce pressure on the healthcare system and society, improve healthcare delivery and promote health equity. However, in order to adopt the patient-centered care system and digitalised healthcare, a whole-system approach in transformation and operation with a co-design in the whole span of digital health initiatives’ developing process are necessary.