A growing elderly population and the increasing portability of medical equipment will help the global patient monitoring devices market to surpass $22 billion by 2018, according to a report published this month by MarketsandMarkets.
Rising incidences of lifestyle diseases also will boost the market's growth, according to the report's authors. The market--valued at $17 billion in 2013--will likely grow at a compound annual rate of 5.5 percent over the next four years.
The Asia-Pacific and North American markets are poised for the most growth, according to the report, while the market research company expects "sluggish" growth in the European market--the second leading contributor to the patient monitoring devices market in 2013--due to "uneven reimbursement policies, declining birth rates" and a reduced number of beds in hospitals.
A similar report published last month by iData Research predicted that the U.S. market for patient monitoring technology will grow to more than $5.1 billion by 2020. That report pointed to the growth of multi-parameter vital sign monitors, electroencephalograms (EEG), electromyograms (EMG), cerebral oximeters and pulse oximetry devices for fueling the market.
Meanwhile, an analysis from Transparency Market Research expects the global medical device connectivity (MDC) market--wired hardware plus wireless hardware and software--will be worth $33.5 billion by 2019. Though wired hardware accounts for 40 percent of the market, wireless technology continues to grow as healthcare providers add Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and wireless medical telemetry services (WMTS).
Eric Topol, M.D., a cardiologist at the Scripps Research Institute in San Diego, who is conducting a clinical trial that hooks up high-risk patients to personal data trackers, has called home monitoring, "the future," adding, "but we've got a long way for this to become routine."
A report published last month by BCC Research predicts that the global mHealth market will hit $21.5 billion by 2018.
To learn more:
- here's the report