Disaggregation, Decentralisation Key Emerging Trends in Healthcare Services: InvAscent

livemint.com:

Disaggregation & Decentralisation The healthcare services industry is witnessing two key trends: “disaggregation of general hospitals wherein focused single specialty hospital networks are offering high-quality facilities and treatments to patients, and decentralisation of healthcare, wherein hospitals are moving out of metros to tier I and II cities. “Over the next decade or so a lot of value is going to be destroyed and created depending on how industry participants react to these trends," Hari said. He observed that the legacy model of large general hospitals in big cities was perhaps a result of low population density, absence of social infrastructure and low purchasing power in the smaller cities.

All of these factors have improved in the past two decades. He added that the emergence of smaller, more specialised hospitals \in tier I and II cities clearly points to the disaggregation of the general hospital model. Hari said that InvAscent was the first to spot this trend towards disaggregation and pioneered investment in the single-specialty space with its investment in the cancer hospitals chain Healthcare Global in 2007.

It has since made investments across specialities such as ophthalmology, dermatology, assisted reproduction, and neonatology & paediatric intensive care. The trend in decentralization is evident too, he said, and pointed to the emergence of 100-200 bed hospitals in tier I, II cities and even in micro markets of large metros that meet the need for immediate medical attention in certain cases. Similarly, the pharmaceutical sector too is witnessing two key changes.