The Future of Health, Healthcare and Healthcare Delivery (Óòkan)

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 Like most things that directly and indirectly affect all men, healthcare delivery does.

Why health and not medicine? Health, presently defined while taking into consideration the different parts that make up a man, seems to be wholesome compared to just medicine. As medical students, the highlight of that definition was including the spiritual entity of men. There is potential for more distinct entities to be added in the future; political health, technological and/or digital health.


Healthcare and its delivery have the potential for major changes in the future and this potential is worth delving into, to help countries of the world and policymakers begin to prepare for what will and might be. The bias to focus on the global south in this future was easily discarded for a broader, global review of the possible future of health.


There are many moving parts to health care and its delivery and all of them have the potential for major changes in the future, both near and far. More importantly, all of these moving parts are not mutually exclusive, but rather, are parts in a far-reaching spectrum that affects the quality of each part. An in-exhaustive list of the parts for convenience includes:


  • The doctor-client consultation

  • Investigations

  • Treatment options

  • Healthy lifestyle



Whatever progress we make in health and biomedical research, at the centre of it all must be patients and this is why healthcare delivery is the most important part of this article’s title. 

This is the first in a series that will focus on my projections about healthcare in the coming decades.

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