Technology Ready to be Launched, but is there a Payer? Challenges for Implementing eHealth in Sweden

The development of a sustainable, high-quality, affordable health care is today a high priority for many actors in the society. This is to ensure that we will continue to afford to care for the growing portion of elderly in our population. One solution is to enable the individual's power over her own health or illness, and participation in her own care. There are evidently opportunities with the rapid development of eHealth and wearable sensors. Tracking and measuring vital data can help to keep people out of the hospital. Loads of data is generated to help us understand disease, to provide us with early diagnostics and warnings. It is providing us with possibilities to collect and capture the true health status of individuals. Successful technologies demonstrate savings, acceptance among users and improved access to healthcare. But there are also challenges. Implementing new technologies in health care is difficult. Researchers from around the world are reporting on similar problems, such as reimbursement, interoperability, usability and regulatory issues. This paper will discuss a few of these implementation challenges as well as a few of the efforts in meeting them. To conclude, eHealth solutions can contribute to patient empowerment and a sustainable health care. Our assumption is however, that as long as we do not face the implementation challenges and invest in overcoming the pressing obstacles, society will not be able, or willing, to pay for the solutions.