Market Overview

Medical information system (EMR [Electronic Medical Record] or EHR [Electronic Health Record]) is deployed at medical institutions (hospitals and general clinics) to increase efficiency and facilitate communications. EMR is playing the central role of the market, as digital transformation has become indispensable for medical care industry.

The lifting of a ban on external storage of medical records in 2010 has allowed private companies to store medical information in data centers. This has formed the market not only for on-premise systems but also for cloud-based systems for EMR and medical imaging systems (PACS), the market of which is spreading widely since then.

Along with the penetration of medical information systems in recent years, the market is seeing more replacements than new installations, which has slowed down the yearly market growth to at around 1 to 2%. Due to postponements of system implementations stemming from the spread of COVID-19, the medical information system market saw a decline from prior year by 3.1% in FY2020. Although the market rebounded in FY2021 with 2.4% year-on-year growth, it slowed down again in FY2022 as sales of medical imaging systems stagnated. Size of the medical information system market for FY2022 showed a marginal growth of 0.4% from preceding year to attain 289,163 million yen (based on the sales at businesses).

Noteworthy Topics

Market Expansion of Cloud-based EMR

The main target of cloud-based EMR is general clinics and small- and medium-sized hospitals. Cloud-based EMR is contributing to the deployment of electronic medical records at these facilities.

Regarding general clinics, the adoption rate of cloud-based EMR is increasing rapidly, particularly among newly opened clinics. Despite the difficult business conditions, the demand for EMR is also high at small- and medium-sized hospitals, from the perspective of securing human resources. They are increasingly adopting cloud-based EMR, for it requires no significant upfront costs and reduces manual labor of medical practitioners.
It is also worth noting that, cloud-based EMR service for large-scale hospital was released in the last few years, and university hospitals have deployed them.

Under the circumstances, the market size of EMR for FY2022 (total of EMR for general hospitals and clinics, based on the sales at businesses) is estimated at 130,738 million yen. The cloud-based EMR market, which represents 7.2% of the whole market with 9,379 million yen, has been showing exponential growth. On the other hand, the on-premise EMR market is forecasted to make a downward turn.  

Future Outlook

As replacements continue to be the majority of the sales, the market size of medical information systems is forecasted to show marginal annual growth of around 1 % for FY2023.
The EMR market, especially that of cloud-based EMR, is expected to expand, underpinned by its penetration at university hospitals and other large-sized hospitals, the targets that had not been tapped earlier.
Cloud-based EMR for general clinics are often comprised of applications such as online pre-diagnostic interview, online appointment, and online diagnostic (which may as well be offered as options). For this reason, the cloud-based EMR is seen as a booster for the introduction of ICT in the field of medicine.

Research Outline