The Exciting Possibilities of Drones in Healthcare
Jan van Londen
Advances in technology and changing regulations will determine how fast these possibilities become a reality
Imagine an elderly diabetic woman living in the isolated mountains of West Virginia. A heavy snowstorm makes travel impossible, as the roads have yet to be plowed. She makes a phone call to her pharmacy, and within 30 minutes, a drone brings insulin to her doorstep... Envision a jogger in Central Park suffering a cardiac arrest. Bystanders call 911, and three minutes later a drone delivers the automated external defibrillators (AEDs), complete with instructions on how to use them... Imagine a six-year-old boy in a village in the Amazon rainforest bitten by a poisonous pit viper. The antivenom is available in Manaus, only 125 miles away in distance but 30 hours in time by car and boat. Fortunately, a drone can deliver the lifesaving antivenom to the village within three hours!
These are just a few examples of the potential for drones in healthcare. The possibilities are limited only by the imagination of how we can apply this amazing technology.
History and Growth of Drone Use
Drones, also known as unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), first appeared over a century ago, originally for military purposes. The first recorded use of UAVs dates back to 1849, when the Austrians attacked the Italian city of Venice using unmanned balloons loaded with explosives. Later, pilotless aircraft developed in World War I employed a radio guidance system to reach targets. The Germans adapted this technology for their V1 rocket program in World War II used to bomb the city of London. Smaller versions of military UAVs introduced in 1990, including the famous Predator drone, were employed in Afghanistan to conduct missile strikes against Taliban militia groups.
The past 10 years witnessed enormous growth in drone innovation, with both commercial and hobbyist versions entering the market. Drones are still in the early stages of mass adoption and usage, but they already have broken through in a number of industries, such as agriculture, search and rescue, geographic mapping, mining, insurance, media, telecommunications, disaster management, wildlife monitoring and weather forecasting. Recently, companies including Amazon, UPS, FedEx, Walmart, and Google have experimented with drones for shipping and delivery.
Endless Possibilities
Drones are relatively new in healthcare; however, their potential use is limitless. They can deliver medical supplies, drugs, blood, lab tests, vaccines and even organs. Drones can fly hundreds of miles in a straight line, unaffected by terrain or traffic, and have the ability to land in tight spaces. They can be used indoors to transport medicine within hospital walls and give elderly patients tools to support them in their homes. Below are some examples of how drones can be integrated in our healthcare system:
“Drone-to-Door” delivery of prescription medications. Drones would allow for quick delivery to people in their homes, including sick and disabled people, the elderly and a parent with a sick child.
Delivery of specimens to central labs. Local hospital labs perform many tests because it takes too long to deliver a specimen to a central laboratory. The ability to perform tests quickly in a central lab allows substantial cost reductions of local lab operations and expensive equipment.
Delivery of blood to trauma victims. Drones can deliver lifesaving blood products from Red Cross distribution facilities to local hospitals significantly faster than a ground delivery vehicle.
Delivery of defibrillators to heart attack victims. Defibrillators have been installed in many public places, but the majority of the public do not know where to find them. Being able to call 911 and have an AED sent by drone can increase the chances a victim will survive a cardiac arrest.
Delivery of organs across town. Organs are highly sensitive and have a short shelf life. The ability to deliver a heart, liver or lung from donor to patient in 15 minutes versus 30 minutes can be the difference between success and failure.
Medical staff and patient transport. Further in the future, deliveries of medical personnel to accidents or of patients to hospitals are in the realm of possibility.
Drones will decrease reliance on humans for transportation and, over time, decrease transportation cost. For example, employing an ambulance or medical courier is costlier than sending a drone. The capability to cover short and long distances at faster speeds to deliver medical products and services also will have significant clinical benefits.
Drones in Healthcare
Drone use in healthcare in the US is still in its infancy. US airspace restrictions, such as regulations that prohibit Beyond Visual Line of Sight (BVLOS) flights for the vast majority of drone users, greatly limit drones’ practicality. In other countries, especially in less-developed countries with weak infrastructures, their use is more common due to less-stringent regulations and greater necessity. BVLOS medical deliveries are common in several countries. Examples include:
VillageReach, a Seattle-based global nonprofit company, teamed with Matternet, a drone company in Silicon Valley, to perform a trial to transport blood samples from remote community hospitals to a large hospital in Lilongwe, Malawi’s capital city.
Zipline, a San Francisco–based UAV startup, has signed a contract with the governments of Ghana and Rwanda to trial transporting blood and medication across the countries. The company reports having saved upward of 21,000 lives by using drones since the company’s inception in 2014.
Vayu Drones, a company operating in Madagascar, delivered stool and blood samples to the country’s central laboratory for testing.
Google’s parent company, Alphabet, is working on “Project Wing” to be used for disaster relief and delivery of food, clean water and other medical supplies. The project has been tested in Queensland, Australia.
Advances and Challenges
US regulations are slowly loosening. For example, the Federal Aviation Administration dropped the pilot license requirement for commercial use of UAVs. Recent improvements in drone technology make drones a more practical option in healthcare. These advances include:
Improvements in battery life
Increased payload capacity
GPS navigation enhancements
Artificial intelligence functions
However, challenges exist that will moderate the growth of drones in the US. Other than battery life and payload limitation, there are safety, privacy and nuisance concerns. Drones are noisy, and many drones flying constantly over residential neighborhoods may not be received well by the public. Also, the more drones there are in the sky, the more likely it is that there will be collisions and drones falling on roofs, cars and people. Consequently, insurance companies likely will require operators to have a minimum amount of flight hours before they are willing to insure someone to operate a UAV.
The task of integrating drones safely into US airspace will be challenging and will have to be accompanied by significant technological improvements in the drones, in their ground control systems and in artificial intelligence.
Conclusions
The future of drones is promising. According to the Drone Market Report 2020–2025, the global drone market will grow from $22.5 billion in 2020 to over $42.8 billion in 2025.
In healthcare, drones are not expected to replace the conventional truck and van deliveries of supplies and equipment anytime soon. Initially, their use likely will grow in situations where time is of the essence or in situations where ground vehicles will have a hard time reaching a destination. Over the next 5 to 10 years, as drone technology, safety and payload capacity increase, drones may become more economical for use in regular, non-urgent small deliveries, such as delivering medicines to people’s homes. In the longer term, they may take on more complicated applications, such as flying health providers to an accident site or flying critically ill patients to a healthcare facility. Advances in technology and changing FAA regulations will determine how fast these exciting possibilities become a reality.