I am not a person in the Internet field, so today I will try to write about the combination of the Internet and medical care. As an outsider, some points may not be accurate enough, but I hope it can give readers some inspiration.
Since its birth, the Internet has exerted tremendous power. Now no one should doubt the important role of the Internet as a tool.
In my opinion, digitalization, big data, informatization, cloud computing, and digital twins are all subdivisions derived from the Internet.
In 2014, or even earlier, many people tried to use the Internet and medical treatment to create Internet medical care. Until now, most of them have failed and left no splash.
Those who remain include WeDoctor, Dingxiangyuan, Haodafu, Chunyu, Alibaba Health, JD Health, Baidu Health, etc. In the future, there may be many institutions and entrepreneurs willing to devote themselves to this .
I have recently observed trends and changes in some industries. It was a bit trivial. I thought about it for a while and decided to record my experience.
If you look at the remaining companies, they all have one thing in common that is doing well. Those who are still struggling may have not understood the nature of the Internet and have gone in the wrong direction.
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The biggest benefit of the Internet is that it eliminates the limitations of time and space.
The biggest benefit of the Internet is that it eliminates the limitations of time and space.
The biggest benefit of the Internet is that it eliminates the limitations of time and space.
Only when you understand this sentence can you truly understand the Internet.
Then we have to look for things that do not depend on time or space. These things can be subverted by the Internet.
Tencent’s WeChat, payment, and games are not dependent on time and space.
Alibaba’s shopping, payment, and finance started with payment. Later, with the rise of logistics, shopping can also get rid of time and space. Then it must be finance.
JD.com also specializes in shopping, logistics, and finance. At first, it could only be connected with information, but later it built its own logistics, creating a closed loop that does not depend on time and space on the C-side.
Meituan uses food delivery as its entry point and traffic entrance, hoping to enter other fields. However, food delivery is extremely dependent on time and space. It is a weak and forced way to break the situation and requires dedication. Huge operating costs. So it seems to have the highest barriers, but in fact it has the worst business model among the Internet giants.
Needless to say, Douyin’s news and video portals are developing rapidly anytime, anywhere.
Baidu search anytime, anywhere.
Returning to Internet medical care, which medical behaviors can be independent of time and space? In my opinion, only 3 points is ok.
Registration, payment, and medicine purchase.
Doctors/nurses’ outpatient services, hospitalization, follow-up visits, prevention, and rehabilitation all have strong offline attributes and cannot be Internetized at all.
Anyone who wants to provide Internet services is going in the wrong direction. Those who do medical searches will definitely not be able to beat the dirty Baidu.
Registration:
Hospital registration is related to medical treatment, not a separate act. Behind the number is a diagnosis and treatment act, or it can only be said to be an appointment. .
When Internet medical care was developing in this direction, I think the early thinking was correct.
However, these startups have overlooked one thing, that is, the registered resource controller is in the hospital and in the hands of doctors. Are hospitals/doctors willing/allowed to put registration resources on your platform for sale? Whether the policy allows free trading of registered resources.
Therefore, it seems that these companies made a wave of money, but later were wiped out due to the policy closure.
Nowadays, most hospitals are developing their own Internet platforms for online registration. To some extent, registration has become Internet-based, or is gradually becoming Internet-based. There is currently no room for commercialization in this part.
Who can integrate the scattered registration information of major hospitals and make only one information collection without any commercial behavior? It may also be a good direction/entry to the Internet.
Buying medicine, buying medicine, buying medicine, this is the most correct way to open Internet medical care.
JD.com, Taobao, Dangdang, Pinduoduo, Meituan, Ele.me, etc. have made the online purchase and sale of items as simple as lying on the bed and clicking your finger, and the items/takeout will be delivered to your hands. .
If policies are not taken into account in the purchase and sale of drugs, the entire logic is smooth.
I won’t go into details about the history of Internet hospitals/Internet medicine selling qualifications, just talk about the present. Were drugs then and now freely bought and sold? Definitely not. Medicines naturally come with the doctor’s right to prescribe them.
A piece of popular science: There are two main categories of drugs we often talk about (including Chinese patent medicines, but not including traditional Chinese medicines), one is prescription drugs, and the other is over-the-counter drugs (OTC drugs).
OTC drugs: OTC is the abbreviation of Over The Counter (drugs that can be purchased over the counter). In the pharmaceutical industry, it specifically refers to over-the-counter drugs. The so-called over-the-counter drugs refer to drugs that consumers can use safely without a doctor's prescription, without the guidance of a medical professional, and can be purchased directly from a pharmacy or pharmacy.
Prescription drugs: These are drugs that can only be prepared, purchased and used with the prescription of a licensed physician or licensed assistant physician;
As mentioned in previous articles, the country’s last round of medical reform set The general tone of supporting medicine with medicine allows hospitals to sell medicines at a higher price, and strictly manages the promotion and sales of medicines. This is coupled with the extensive coverage of medical insurance. Therefore, if people want to buy prescription medicines, they basically have to go to the hospital, register with a doctor, and the doctor will prescribe Get a prescription and pick it up at the hospital pharmacy.
Drugs are the main way of making money for hospitals, and the hospital’s pharmacy is an important profit window for hospitals/doctors, so doctors’ prescription rights are also firmly controlled within the hospital.
Now the policy is undergoing huge changes because of medical insurance. . . (The 1,000-word background introduction is omitted here), so the payment methods for drugs will undergo major changes in the future. Although medical insurance will still be the mainstay, the proportion of other payment methods will increase, such as self-pay, commercial insurance, etc.
From a national level, we will support the outflow of prescriptions and the purchase of drugs outside hospitals, but it will only set the tone and I don’t care about the details.
From the manufacturer level, if you can bypass the price increase of dealers/hospitals and sell directly to the C-end, this is something that can make you laugh out of your dreams.
From the hospital level, no matter how unwilling it is, it can only passively accept policy changes, and can only use various administrative means to delay the progress of the matter in disguise. After all, the entry of drugs into the hospital, the volume of drugs, and the unification of prescriptions are all in the interests of the relevant person in charge.
From the perspective of Internet entrepreneurship, the future is bright but the road is tortuous. After all, what he wants to grab is the existing huge interest pattern. Why should others give up such a big cake? Why should you be the one who gets to eat the cake in the end? You need to be strong to make iron.
(Think of the movie Dune. The male protagonist’s family suddenly got a pie from the sky. A planet like a gold mine was ceded to them from a hostile force. They did not respond well and thought it was an opportunity. The result was that the entire family was wiped out.)
Therefore, we can see that many surviving Internet medical companies have begun to serve as distributors, selling drugs/devices.
Some investors will sneer and laugh at the rapid revenue growth of these companies, but they are actually selling drugs/devices. But in my eyes, this is the most correct way to open Internet medical care.
Back to that sentence, the first are martyrs, and the right ones are warriors.
If you grab profits when the time is not right, you may end up with a bloody head. When the time comes, entering at the right time may be a matter of course.
Centralized purchasing has caused the price of hospital drugs to plummet. The zero markup on drugs has made it unprofitable for hospitals to sell drugs. Doctors' prescriptive powers are becoming less and less valuable to hospitals.
The value of prescription rights to physical hospitals is shrinking, but for Internet hospitals, it is a rare treasure. The prescription rights that do not make money are also traffic, and they are extremely cheap traffic.
The right to prescribe innovative drugs, non-medical insurance drugs, and high-priced specialty drugs is a reflection of GMV.
I believe that the next few years will be a golden age for selling drugs on the Internet.
The essence of JD.com, Taobao, and Pinduoduo is Internet malls, and they earn rent from Internet malls. (Offline malls/stores are having a hard time, right?)
Which platform can seize the opportunity of the outflow of prescriptions and become an Internet pharmacy mall, so that it can earn rent from Internet pharmacies. (Life will be even more difficult for offline pharmacies)
JD Health/Alibaba Health quickly went on the market because they knew the nature of selling goods on the Internet. What Ping An Good Doctor is exactly is confusing.
For other Internet platforms that have a large number of doctors and patients, you should have a clear idea of ??what to do next. If we continue to provide services, consultations, surgeries, etc., then there is really something wrong with our strategy.
As for payment, it depends on the product. With product transactions, payment will naturally start.
In the past and now, patients registered in various ways and saw a doctor in person. Then the doctor wrote a prescription, the patient paid the fee at the hospital, took the prescription to the hospital pharmacy, picked up the medicine, and went home.
Imagine the future. Before seeing a doctor (except for emergencies), take out your mobile phone, find the doctor you want to see on a platform, and make an appointment. Then you see a doctor offline. After seeing the doctor, the doctor writes a prescription. The hospital pays part of the fee and goes to the pharmacy with the prescription to pick up the medicine. Some of the bills are paid online, the patient goes home, and after a while, takeaway/express delivery delivers the medicine to his or her door.
I won’t go into detail about the relevant chain of interests. Only those who can figure this out are qualified people in the medical field. Those who can’t figure it out should not invest in medicine.
As I write this, I suddenly feel that I should also expand on commercial insurance and dealers, and also talk about hospital informatization and out-of-hospital informatization. To expand further, it is the informatization of hospitals for medical insurance, the informatization of hospitals for commercial insurance, the informatization/CRM of pharmaceutical companies/distributors, and the informatization of personal medical terminals.
I’ll write more when I have time, that’s it.