Catherine Li, associate communications manager of corporate affairs at AstraZeneca China, introduces the history and development of the company’s Commercial Innovation Center in Wuxi National Hi-tech District. [Photo/en.wiotexpo.cn]

Global pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca are helping the city of Wuxi in East China’s Jiangsu province build a cutting-edge health care ecosystem integrating new internet of things technology. 

AstraZeneca, together with 30 other partners, has applied IoT technology to various theranostics projects, focusing on respiration, cardiology, metabolism, oncology and gastroenterology, which are the most urgent needs of Chinese patients.

Some of the projects have already been applied in hospitals in Wuxi, improving the standards of the city’s health care system and accelerating the application of IoT in the health industry. 

The AstraZeneca Commercial Innovation Center, located in Wuxi National Hi-tech District, is also working on projects to promote innovation in the health system and IoT-based health care. 

The center aims to accelerate the development and adoption of new IoT health solutions, and integrate resources from across society to create a medical ecosystem focused on patient benefits. 

The end goal is to build an IoT-integrated health system that can manage the entire patient journey, from prevention to diagnosis, treatment and after-treatment care. 

“IoT offers the chance to monitor the condition of patients in real time, and combine the information with the present medical system to provide more specific therapy for patients,” said Xu Jing, vice president of AstraZeneca China. 

As one of the centers of the IoT industry in China, Wuxi is expected to act as a testing ground for internet of things health care. If the trials are successful, the solutions could be rolled out to other cities across China, and possibly to countries involved in China’s Belt and Road Initiative, in the future.