What’s the Role of Wearable Tech in the Health Insurance Sector?

• Written by Mudit Handa

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The integration of technology in the healthcare sector goes beyond advanced machines for treatment purposes. Wearable tech has become an integral part of the healthcare sector by offering features like tracking daily steps, calorie count, heart rate and a lot more. Interestingly, the Indian market has grown comfortable with wearable tech better than most of the developed nations. A study suggested that India’s wearable tech market is the third largest in the world.1 

What is Wearable Technology?

Simply put, wearable technology is used to denote devices that can be worn as an accessory by an individual to keep track of everyday physical activity. These devices are equipped with sensors that provide accurate and real-time data. Smartwatches and fitness trackers are possibly the most common type of wearable devices.  

Wearable Tech and Healthcare Industry

The integration of wearable tech in healthcare and overall wellness has now become a part of insurance policies, as well. Professionals responsible for designing health insurance policies have been experimenting with wearable technology to monitor the health of policy owners or seekers. Devices offering fitness tracks are being used to get insight into a person’s health and the accuracy makes them more reliable than any other method. 

What’s interesting is the impact of wearable tech on health insurance premiums. There has been a growth in incentives provided to policy owners based on their performance track on wearable devices. 

Let’s unveil the role of wearable technology in healthcare and how they are being leveraged by both policy providers and policy seekers to grab exciting rewards, discounts and bonuses. 

Wearable Technology: Accessible Options to Explore

Wearable technology is designed to promise a seamless experience that doesn’t bother an individual's everyday chores. Let’s take a look at wearable devices that have paved their way into the health insurance industry in one way or another: 

Smart Watches

A smartwatch is designed like a regular wristwatch but is equipped with smart tech to closely monitor an individual’s heartbeat, oxygen levels, fall detection and a lot more. Modern smartwatches come with several other features that have made them extremely popular.

Fitness Trackers

A fitness tracker, designed like a smartwatch, is used solely to keep track of an individual’s daily physical activity ranging from steps taken to heart rate, oxygen level, calorie burn etc.

Smart Glasses

Although smart glasses are slightly less popular in the healthcare sector, modern options have introduced new features that can be used in teleconsultation. Smart Glasses are designed like regular glasses but have displays that feature information. These can be used for virtual screening of a patient. 

Blood Pressure Monitoring

Individuals  with chronic hypertension rely on blood pressure monitors for close monitoring. Wearable blood pressure monitors help policy providers quickly evaluate an individual's cardiovascular health and provide insurance benefits accordingly.  

Did You Know that around 80% of people in metro cities use wearable technology to track their fitness levels. 2

Benefit of Wearable Tech on Health Insurance Premiums 

The healthcare sector leverages the popularity of wearable technology to design policies and even amend premium rates. Let’s understand the impact of wearable tech on health insurance premiums in detail: 

Enhanced Life Quality equates to Lesser Chances of Sickness

As more individuals continue to rely on wearable tech to keep track of their everyday physical activity, the chances of getting healthier increase. These devices not only track activities but send reminders to motivate the person to walk, run and even drink water. The efficiency of wearable tech is a reliable metric for insurance companies to evaluate an individual to offer discounts or reduced premiums basis on their impressive fitness levels. 

Did You Know that Care Health Insurance has introduced a Healthy Rewards Program that provides reward points by recognising the fitness activities of an individual through tracking applications and devices? Also, one of its unique feature wellness benefit offers premium discounts up to 30% for achieving the active days target, where 10k steps is equal to 1active day. The calculation of premium discount somehow looks like this:

Track Chronic Conditions for Better Planning

An individual dealing with any chronic condition or disease is more likely to opt for a health insurance plan. Health insurance companies are increasingly becoming dependent on wearable tech devices to track these conditions and better plan their insurance policies. Whether it is to track sugar levels, blood pressure levels or even cholesterol, wearable tech is designed to provide accurate results. 

Easy Risk Assessment

Wearable devices like smart watches or fitness trackers are equipped to provide real-time information about an individual’s health that insurance companies use to assess the health risks of an individual. A simple rule that almost every insurance company follows is that higher chances of health risks call for higher premiums as the chances of those individuals raising a claim are higher, too. Unlike earlier, wearable tech has made risk assessment easier, and this also saves individuals from paying high premium rates if they are less likely to fall sick. 

>>Read More: 8 Key Healthcare Technology Trends in 2024

Summing Up 

The integration of wearable tech devices in the healthcare sector has brought multiple benefits for insurance companies and policyholders. While data privacy remains a concern, the benefit overpowers. The future of these devices looks even more promising for the healthcare sector as we are likely to witness enhanced accuracy and even predictive results to help identify signs of cognitive decline. It is safe to say that the future of the healthcare sector is intertwined with wearable technology, and we can’t  wait to see its magic. 

At Care Health Insurance, we understand that adapting to modern methods of assessment is appreciated, and policyholders with impressive fitness levels are to be rewarded. 

Disclaimers:All plan features, benefits, coverage, and claims underwriting are subject to policy terms and conditions. Kindly refer to the brochure, sales prospectus, and policy documents carefully.