The U.S. healthcare market: medical alarms

The healthcare industry is the largest in the world, and the home healthcare market in developed countries, in particular, is growing rapidly, notes Wearable Health Solutions.

This market is driven in part by the aging of the baby boom generation and a growing shift toward moving some types of healthcare from the hospital to the home.

Overall, according to Wearable Health Solutions, these trends make the home healthcare sector an increasingly attractive market for successful companies offering effective solutions in the Personal Emergency Response System (PERS) industry space.

The common use of personal medical alarms is to protect the elderly and people with certain medical conditions who are unable to call for help by traditional means, such as a phone call.

Medical alarms mitigate potential harm and costly hospital stays caused by falls or other accidents, as tracking devices, such as the iHelp+3G with wearable biosensors, monitor users’ condition.

Healthcare

The PERS market has boomed in recent years due to the growing aging population worldwide.

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the number of people over the age of 65 in the U.S. will increase from about 34 million to about 65 million by 2025.

By 2050, this statistic is expected to reach 86.7 million, with many people living at home or in an alternative home-like setting.

Worldwide, this figure is expected to double from the current 550 million 65-year-olds to more than 1.2 billion seniors by 2025.

Healthcare experts predict that many of these seniors will prefer to continue living independently at home for as long as possible.

This population is expected to be more technologically savvy as consumers of healthcare services and very interested in playing an active role in the personal management of their health and well-being.

They may consider technologies that help them access care while remaining independent and outside of a hospital setting.

According to industry statistics, PERS users tend to be people over the age of 75, predominantly women and living alone. PERS purchasers are often the children of end users.

Companies

Lifeline Systems, the founder of the PERS industry in the United States approximately 35 years ago, was serving 250,000 users in the United States and Canada in 1992.

Today, the acquisition of Lifeline Medical Alarm by Philips Medical Systems has positioned it as the largest provider of traditional PERS systems, with more than 700,000 monitored accounts, implying that the total size of the user market is likely much larger.

Wearable Health Solutions offers mobile health (mHealth) products and services to a significant number of licensees and distributors around the world (Canada, United States, New Zealand and Bermuda).

As a provider of personal emergency response devices, in the medical alarm devices and e-health sector, the company offers innovative wearable health products, tracking services and turnkey solutions that enable its users to be proactive with their health, as well as safe and secure.

According to QYResearch’s Global PERS devices report, MediPendant was the 17th largest PERS company worldwide based on revenue in 2021.