Use of Computers in Business

BUSI1067 Computers in Business
Group Assessment: Cover Page
Semester 1 2021-22
A study on how digital platforms empower healthcare businesses in
China: Enhancing the diabetes management by building an online
platform
Chen ZHANG (20319988)
Huanxin YING (20320208)
Jiamu GUO (20321108)
Jianing QI (20321089)
Yiqing WANG (20321092)
Ziyan ZHANG (20320154)

The healthcare industry plays a crucial role in improving people's quality of life
and promoting national economic development. However, the traditional
healthcare industry in China is facing challenges and diabetes is a typical
example. As a prevalent chronic disease, the high morbidity and huge treatment
costs of diabetes have become a concern partly due to the lack of
comprehensive medical services (Wild et al., 2004). According to Zhou et al.
(2020), the number of diabetes patients in China has increased rapidly in recent
decades, from 55.2 million in 2000 to 140 million in 2020, an increase of 150%.
Moreover, diabetes is a primary cause of disability and premature death because
it leads to complications in many organs. As noted by Du (2021), one hundred
and forty thousand people died from diabetes in 2016 in China and the losses of
gross domestic product due to diabetes were estimated to reach US$17 trillion.
These data demonstrate a huge burden of diabetes on individuals, society and
the country, but also show potential opportunities. Zhou et al. (2020) suggested
that manageability is a characteristic of diabetes; thus providing high-quality
prevention, treatment and care services has a positive role in prolonging
patients’ lives and reducing economic losses. Although traditional medical
institutions lack the ability to support the above services, with the development
of technology, electronic platforms based on multiple technologies can make it
possible. As a consulting company, this essay will center around a study on how
digital platforms empower China's diabetes business to help investors realize
business opportunities.
Existing medical resources are provided by offline medical institutions and online
medical platforms, which cannot fully meet the needs of patients. The offline
medical institutions provide a relatively single type of service and the quality is
uneven. LeRouge et al. (2010) pointed out that as information sharing is
blocked, high-quality medical resources are often concentrated in a few offline

hospitals, namely third-class hospitals, which only account for 7.7% of the total
number of hospitals in China. In addition, these medical resources are mainly
used in the treatment stage and little attention has been paid to the two equally
important phases of prevention and care. For instance, the telephone follow-up
method is used by hospitals as a nursing service, which has been proven to be
inefficient and cannot fully assess the patient’s condition. As for online medical
systems, although some platforms such as online consultation and disease
knowledge popularization have been developed to make up for the lack of
offline, they are at a preliminary stage and further improvements can be made
in the content of the supply (Deshpande, Harris-Hayes and Schootman, 2008).
Based on the shortcomings of existing medical institutions and the
characteristics of electronic platforms that can make up for these deficiencies,
the huge business opportunities in the medical industry can be clearly seen. In
analyzing these opportunities brought by electronic platforms in the healthcare
industry, the article will discuss respectively from the perspectives of consumers,
suppliers and government.
For consumers, the acceptance of digital platforms and willingness to pay for
high-quality medical resources has continued to increase. With the rapid
development of technology, consumers are beginning to transform their access
to medical resources as commercialization of IT makes the core functions of it
available to the public. From the analysis of the theme searched by Chinese
Internet users in 2016, health and medical services accounted for 53.78% of the
search on the eight topics, ranking first (Liu et al., 2017). Moreover, because of
the COVID-19 pandemic, patients' demand for online medical resources has
increased sharply, which raised the recognition of electronic platforms indirectly.

As noted by Zhou et al. (2020), due to fear of contracting the coronavirus,
65.4% of the patients were reluctant to physically present to the offline
hospitals. It can be seen that the recognition of electronic platforms by
consumers is showing an upward trend. Additionally, the personal health
expenditure in 2000 was 270.52 billion yuan, and by 2012 it reached 956.46
billion yuan, quadrupling from 2000, with an average annual growth rate of
11.8%, which shows people’s increasing emphasis and demand on health.
Suppliers of electronic platforms are able to provide high-level services with the
support of multiple technologies. Not only can these services solve the problems
in the traditional medical industry, but also create new models. For example, a
platform dedicated to diabetes management can be created to solve the problem
of the uneven distribution of regional medical resources and improve the chronic
disease management system by carrying out forecasting and nursing services.
To be more specific, first, medical data acquisition system collects big data
through multiple sources such as electronic medical records, research data and
data collected by mobile medical devices (Zhu and Zhu, 2021). Then, by
applying digital backbone, these data can be accessed by nursing institutions
when needed. Thus, doctors can be informed of correct information such as
disease history in time (Liu et al., 2017). Meanwhile, based on the collected
relevant information, artificial intelligence will push systematic and
comprehensive evidence and expert opinions to doctors to support data-based
practice (Cai et al., 2019).
This service will be fruitful, as the benefits obtained can be substantial. Firstly, it
solves problem of uneven distribution of regional medical resources and reduces