Medical device manufacturers are likely to face the same challenges they have faced since the beginning of the pandemic this year, such as compliance with procedures and a lack of hospital staff.

As the coronavirus pandemic enters its third year, the medical device industry is likely to face another year of challenge as procedural compliance and a shortage of hospital staff increase by 2022.

Six months later, medical technicians are recovering from the first year of the pandemic as vaccinations have increased, the number of interventions has continued to increase and hospital operations have returned to normal.

After the delta option increased recovery plans, forcing companies to prepare for further growth and delays requires a return to normal, which will also hit the end of 2021 with the rapid spread of the more portable omicron.

resumed calls for doctors in 2022 and revisited the questions the sector had raised over the past two years: When will the volume of methods return to normal? How will hospital staff affect the operation? And if or when will there be another increase?

While all eyes are again on the impact of the pandemic, topics such as another problem of mergers and acquisitions and methods that continue with outpatient surgical centers (ASCs) are among the other leaders. medtech trend to look back to 2022.

Change the number of methods

The number of operations will fluctuate in 2021 and this year it will not be different. After medtech CEO at JP Morgan Healthcare earlier this month was relatively calm about the impact of the omicron on their companies, Intuitive Surgical and Johnson & Johnson announced recent revenue calls that volumes are likely to decline in the first quarter, if not. first half. While many companies announce their last quarter in the coming weeks - looking briefly at the early impact of omicrons and the continuing impact of the delta - experts are planning more pressure on methods.

Companies have recently warned that Omicron will curb irrelevant practices in the first quarter of the year, and given the differences that have caused a sharp increase in the last weeks of the fourth quarter and in the initial weeks ahead, it may take months for the industry to realize this. full effect variant.

Analysts agree that the ongoing COVID-19 epidemic and possible future growth will maintain how fast companies are operating due to methodological shortcomings, which physicians will continue to focus on in 2020 and 2021 as a positive sign for future revenue as most procedures need to be performed. will take place at the end.

Necessary care has been closed several times over the last two years to conserve hospital resources and make beds available for patients with COVID-19. However, this latest increase may have a new element.

Lack of work in the hospital

Staff shortages have been a problem for hospitals and other healthcare facilities for most of the past year, and the problem seems to have widened as many industry executives have pointed to a slowdown in staff shortages.

Given that labor shortages are reportedly the most important factor in volume pressure in the coming year, any new increase may exacerbate the problem of burnout or worker fatigue. In addition, the small staff limits the number of procedures that can be performed in the facility, even

Growth for ASC

A by-product of hospital closure methods is the migration of operations to ASC - a trend that began before the pandemic but has since disappeared, forcing companies to rethink their business strategies.

ASCs provide alternative areas of care for specific procedures, allowing hospitals to open beds and save resources. In recent years, CMS has enabled Medicare to cover many ASCs and meditators such as Stryker, J&J and Zimmer Biomet have focused more on these devices.

The companies not only use ASC to replace procedural volumes as in the early days of the pandemic, but now manufacture custom products for specific facilities. 

An important question is how many volumes will be returned to hospitals as the pandemic progresses. Stryker CEO Kevin Lobo said in January 2021 that the move was sustained and would only accelerate, a forecast that would be correct if the pandemic persisted.