Why 'digital health' is the wrong frame

Healthcare doesn't have a digital problem. It has an infrastructure problem.

The term "digital health" implies that healthcare is waiting to be digitised — that the solution is taking what exists and putting it on a screen. Better interfaces. Slicker apps. Faster forms.

But the problem isn't the interface. It's what sits beneath it.

Most clinical systems were designed around episodes: a consult here, a prescription there, a pharmacy visit somewhere else. Each interaction is captured in isolation. The patient moves through the system, but the system doesn't move with the patient.

The result is structural fragmentation. Not because anyone chose it — because the infrastructure layer was never designed for continuity.

"Digital health" is a framing that accepts the existing architecture and tries to make it faster. What healthcare technology actually needs is a rebuilt foundation — the data layer, the prescribing loop, the care pathway — so that continuity isn't an afterthought. It's the default.

This isn't a software problem. It's a systems design problem. And it requires a different kind of builder — one who understands that the interface is the last thing you build, not the first.