Positioning France as a leader in digital healthcare

As part of the "France Relance" Plan and the Programme d'Investissements d'Avenir (PIA 4), the government launched work in early 2021 to build the "Santé Numérique" acceleration strategy. Through this initiative, the aim is to prepare for the future and help make France a leader in digital healthcare worldwide.
Digital technology is at the heart of a revolution in the healthcare sector. It is also the bearer of an ambition to invent an effective response to the sector's challenges and accelerate the switch to so-called "5P" medicine: personalized, preventive, predictive, participative and evidence-based. This transformation of digital healthcare must be carried out for the benefit of the general population and patients. In this context, the actions driven by the acceleration strategy will aim to foster the emergence of innovative solutions, based on multidisciplinary scientific approaches and ambitious medico-economic models, to conquer the rapidly growing digital healthcare market worldwide.

A public consultation outlines the strategy's first actions

Over a period of 6 weeks, a public consultation was held with ecosystem players to clarify and guide the digital health acceleration strategy. This consultation gathered 429 responses, 52% of which came from companies. This large number of responses testifies not only to the high expectations of the players involved, but also to their willingness to take part in building the strategy that will be implemented over the next 5 years.
Analysis of the responses to this public consultation revealed 4 main themes. Among the feedback from the various players, we note the desire to simplify and facilitate market access. Respondents also stressed the importance of meeting the challenges of funding and experimentation, as well as the desire to strengthen France's strategic advantage, particularly in the field of AI and the use of healthcare data. Lastly, to enable optimal acceleration of the sector and strengthen the confidence of players, it is essential to involve users in the development stages of digital services while building a training offer for players in the challenges of digital healthcare.
Based on the lessons learned from the public consultation, a series of additional interviews with representative players in the ecosystem will be conducted over the coming weeks.
The Digital Health acceleration strategy thus finalized will be presented in summer 2021.

This wide-ranging public consultation has enabled the ecosystem to express its expectations and priorities, while contributing to the prefiguration of future calls for projects.

• The public consultation was open for 6 weeks and garnered 429 responses.
• The results of this consultation help to refine and prioritize the content of the acceleration strategy, but also contribute to the prefiguration of relevant calls for projects to be deployed rapidly.
• The consultation is also informed by the work of the Conseil du Numérique en Santé (CNS) industry working group. A first mid-term review has been carried out and the final report will be published shortly.