Telemedicine on the rise in South Korea despite legal barriers

COVID-19 has forced the government to speed up the regulatort infrastructure around telemedicine initiatives.

South Korea has made significant technological advancements in telemedicine despite the fact that telemedicine is still prohibited by the law, a transition pushed mainly due to the widespread outbreak of COVID-19, reports Fitch Solutions.

The country has been implementing pilot programmes on telemedicine across various groups ranging from remote-island and disabled populations, to deployed soldiers and inmates of correctional facilities. Through these programmes, South Korea has been able to develop the tools and technologies required for wide-scale telemedicine to be implemented, noted Fitch.

Further, the government has allowed telemedicine on a trial basis despite fierce opposition from the doctors who are concerned about the safety of the service. Seoul National University Hospital began to provide a telemedicine service with four doctors and thirteen nurses to COVID-19 patients near the epicenter of South Korea's virus outbreak.

With the government expected to continue utilising telemedicine to improve the healthcare delivery efficiency, the country has now become a hot spot for healthcare providers, according to Fitch.

Already, major Korean conglomerates are investing in digital healthcare research and collaborating internationally. Chief amongst them is Samsung Electronics, which has already made an investment in preventable medicine and health functionality development. Mobile network operator SK Telecom has also signed a deal with local biotech firm Macrogen to develop an AI solution for genome analysis to help cancer patients get the right chemotherapy treatment.