Reducing Costs to Broaden Early Diagnosis Availability

Q: What is your strategic vision for GE HealthCare in Mexico, and what will be the company’s main priorities and goals under your leadership?

A: For GE HealthCare, Mexico is a high-priority market with the potential to explore new precision healthcare technologies, which is why for more than 125 years we have sought to be an agent of change for the improvement of the healthcare system in the country.

Mexico is one of the five clusters into which we divide Latin America but, unlike the others, it is independent because it is one of the largest markets, along with Brazil.  Each cluster has its own strategy based on its unique needs. In Mexico, the focus is on reaching the mainly public healthcare market. This determines our staffing, resource allocation, and the way we market and promote our products and solutions in each region.

Our main priority in Mexico is to continue to be a leader in the ultrasound market by producing and selling equipment, supporting the industry and connecting diagnostic, therapeutic, and monitoring technologies with digital and analytical capabilities to improve healthcare outcomes.

In Latin America, our main objective is to continue to maintain our position as market leaders in four key segments: Ultrasound, Primary Care Solutions (PCS), Pharmaceutical Diagnostics (PDx), and Imaging, our strongest segment, which includes magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and computed tomography (CT), as well as to continue to increase our growth prospects throughout the region.

Q: What key challenges will you target as GE HealthCare’s president and CEO Latin America?

A: I have a mission to bring healthcare to all people and I believe that all of us, be it private sector, government, or even health caregivers, need to work as a team to increase the quantity and quality of life. My main challenge is to maintain and catapult GE HealthCare's position as the strategic partner to public and private institutions so that together we provide access to healthcare services for developing countries in Latin America, where government budgets are often limited.

While it is also a challenge to work hand-in-hand with regulators, who must find the right balance between speed and ensuring the safety of the devices, technology, and drugs available, I am confident that GE HealthCare will continue to be a key technology-driven company, bringing more efficiency, innovation, precision and productivity. This is how we can do more for patients and sustainability of health as a whole. We want to position GE HealthCare as the partner of choice for our customers, both for the quality of our products and solutions, and for the high level of service and human talent we provide.

Q: What are the main priorities on GE Healthcare Mexico’s agenda for 2024, and how do these align with the healthcare needs and market trends in the country?

A: At GE HealthCare, our priorities revolve around the patient. We offer a wide range of products and technology, because not every organization or private group has the same needs. Our technology can be deployed in locations without sufficient power supply or in other complex environments. Even in remote areas, our technologies remain viable and can be used to diagnose patients.

For example, GE HealthCare's CT technology is characterized by detector coverage ranging from 16 to 512 slices. This illustrates how we can tailor our technology to patients' needs and design solutions tailored to the institution's specific requirements. We can adjust to the infrastructure capabilities of hospitals and clinics. This adaptability extends to all our modalities, ensuring comprehensive personalization, but also aligns with the trend in Mexico to improve access, especially in the preventive field. This access has been driven mainly by outpatient clinics throughout the country, which offer affordable lab tests, mammograms, X-rays, MRIs, CT scans and other technologies that help in the early identification of many diseases has increased rapidly in recent years.

The industry has significantly reduced the cost of receiving an early diagnosis or exam. At GE HealthCare, we collaborate with a variety of healthcare providers to find ways to reduce costs while increasing access. Depending on the number of hours you wish to open your clinic, there is a limit to the number of MRI exams that can be performed per day. Increasing the number of exams allows for greater access and reduced costs.

Q: How are GE HealthCare’s priorities expected to evolve over the next year, and what drivers will influence this change?

A: We are a company with over 125 years of history that remains relevant precisely because we are constantly evolving. From our perspective, an evolving landscape includes telemedicine/remote care, connected care ecosystems, and care pathways. That is why we invest over US$1 billion in R&D every year.

At GE HealthCare, we believe that digital innovations solve capacity issues and improve efficiency, reducing the burden on clinicians by extracting meaning from thousands of data points in the patient health process (sometimes automatically) in minutes; providing a chronological view of the health history, thanks to interoperability; analyzing multimodal data to personalize it, identify trends, and flag potential problems; and accelerating cloud adoption in picture archiving and communication system (PACS) and enterprise imaging.

We are convinced that new innovations help achieve a more human and flexible experience, and we will continue to collaborate with leading academic, government, and research institutions — NHS, Oxford, John Hopkins, and UW Madison — and pursue strategic acquisitions to strengthen the core capabilities of our ever-evolving technology.

Q: How does GE HealthCare plan to expand its footprint in Mexico, and what considerations are being made regarding portfolio planning to support economic growth?

A: Our goal is to get more patients access to our broad range of products, technologies, and solutions, which aim to improve patient outcomes by providing clinicians with the right data at the right time to enable personalized, connected, and compassionate care, while simplifying the patient journey. 

To this end, in Mexico, we invest heavily in the training of medical professionals. Every piece of equipment we sell is extensively designed for the medical applications in which it will be used. In addition, we organize numerous national and international events throughout the year in which we provide instruction and advice on how to use our technology most effectively. We hold an international ultrasound training event called LASUS, which is the most prestigious ultrasound training event of the year for all of Latin America. Over the course of several years, LASUS has brought together physicians from all over the region, offering state-of-the-art, high-end ultrasound scanning locations and training.

We also collaborate with authorities through the Mexican Association of Innovative Medical Device Industries (AMID) and other associations to help our Mexican colleagues understand the accelerated cycles of innovation, technology, and adoption of new products and services, such as AI. 

Q: What recent achievements have been made in the consolidation of GE HealthCare in Mexico?

A: In Mexico, we have the largest base of densitometers in the world, and we recently signed an agreement with Salud Digna to standardize care protocols in tomography, magnetic resonance, and ultrasound examinations through two digital solutions that will improve service to the over 20 million patients that this institution serves each year. We also have Pristina in the country, a state-of-the-art mammography created entirely by women and for women, which operates in various parts of the country.

Q: What role does digital transformation play in GE HealthCare’s strategy for Mexico, particularly in terms of digital solutions and AI in healthcare?

A: Our goal is to be a leader in AI technology and solutions. GE HealthCare invests US$1 billion a year in R&D, and plans to increase this investment in the future. Our MRI AI solution can reduce MRI exam time by 40%-50%, depending on the protocol. This impressive time savings benefits both patient comfort and operational efficiency. In addition, we have 58 industry-leading AI and ML technologies to help physicians achieve greater connectivity, find trends, detect potential health problems, and identify patients who will respond to therapies. 

With industry-leading AI and ML technologies, we have helped increase efficiency and detect potential health issues. In addition, we drive new technology user training and improved patient outcomes and have built AI capabilities internally and alongside strategic partners, such as the Gates Foundation, MGB, and Caption Health.

Q: How does GE HealthCare differentiate its approach to digital health in Mexico compared to other regions, and what opportunities do you see for further innovation in this area?

A: New ideas can be tested in Mexico and Latin America. Culturally, people in the region are more open to trying different things, which leads to innovative approaches to healthcare. This mentality makes it a unique source of new ideas and solutions. Latin America is exporting technologies and processes to more developed countries.

There are many opportunities, as Latin America is a growing and emerging region. Unlike Japan, the United States, or the European Union, where the population is aging and stable, here the population is younger and growing. This alone can drive double-digit growth over the next five years. As the economy improves, more people are accessing healthcare services, creating new opportunities for GE HealthCare.

GE HealthCare is a global leader in medical technology, pharmaceutical diagnostics, and innovative digital solutions. It is dedicated to providing integrated solutions, services, and data analytics to make hospitals and doctors more efficient.