Automation and Robotics in Hospitals

Miss Cheng Li Hui asked the Minister for Health (a) how has the progress of automation in our hospitals been in the last three years; (b) how prevalent is the use of robotics; and (c) what is the estimated increase in productivity.

As Singapore's population ages, we are faced with tighter labour constraints and a rising demand for healthcare services. Healthcare providers have to focus on productivity and improve operational efficiency to continue delivering quality care to patients.

Productivity in healthcare is about increasing value to patients, for example, by doing more with the same amount of resources. One initiative under our Productivity Drive is to use automation and robotics as a workforce multiplier to reduce the amount of manual work and enable older employees to continue working for a longer period of time.

Since 2012, the Ministry of Health (MOH) has supported healthcare providers to invest in productivity improvements. We have funded more than 200 projects so far, including those involving automation and robotics. Examples include the use of pneumatic tube systems for sending documents and specimens, and the automation of laboratory analysis processes. Hospitals are also using Automated Guided Vehicles to transport inventory items and deliver meals, and deploying automated cleaning robots, remote patient monitoring devices to improve their productivity.

Another example is the Pharmacy Automation System, which allows medications to be picked more accurately and quickly. This has reduced pharmacy waiting times by up to 50% in KK Women's and Children's Hospital (KKH), National University Hospital and Tan Tock Seng Hospital. The Outpatient Pharmacy Automation System (OPAS) at KKH's Emergency Pharmacy was further developed to incorporate a new robotic bottle medication dispensing system that automatically loads, picks, and packs bottles. One year into implementation, OPAS has helped KKH to increase its pharmacy capacity by close to 30% with the same staff strength.

We are also exploring new ways to deliver healthcare, such as through tele-health, where consultations can be performed via video to reduce physical clinic visits. Physiotherapists could prescribe rehabilitation exercises to patients at home and monitor their progress remotely using wearable sensors and analytics. To bring healthcare beyond hospitals into the community, we are scaling up our national tele-health platforms to more healthcare institutions and community care providers.

In addition, public healthcare institutions are reviewing their workflow and processes. This includes redesigning job roles and upskilling healthcare staff to provide better care for patients. MOH will continue to work closely with our healthcare institutions to support productivity initiatives that enhance patient care and service quality and make our healthcare system more productive and sustainable.