Now, specialised docs to come to your doorstep
Remote monitoring
To bridge the gap between demand and supply of expertise in treating patients needing critical care, a private hospital on Friday launched electronic remote monitoring programme.
Doctors in Delhi will see patients, their real time data on monitors and suggest needed treatment to the doctors in small towns.
CritiNext, a joint programme of Fortis Healthcare and GE Healthcare is based on the concept of eICU.
The monitoring system is aided by two-way audio-visual.
Up to 200 kinds of data of a patient can be accessed at a time, nearly a simulation of real ICU data. Thus, the patient will not have to be physically transferred to another location for more expertise.
“According to estimates, 10 per cent of all hospital admissions require ICU care. We have only 70,000 well equipped ICU beds though there is a demand of four lakh for five million people per year. Less than 15 per cent receive dedicated and needed personal care,” said Dr Amit Varma, executive director, CritiNext.
Varma added through monitoring in Delhi, CritiNext will be able to provide specialist care at the point where it is needed in a cost effective way.
The group has started the facility in Raipur and Dehradun branches of Fortis covering 34 ICU beds. It targets to increase it to 500 beds in 20 small towns by 2014.
The patient has to pay Rs 500 per day for the facility in addition to other hospital charges. “Once we get 500 beds, the cost will come down to Rs 200-300 as our present infrastructure can take that much load,” said Aditya Vij, CEO, Fortis Healthcare Ltd.
He added it is much less as compared to the cost incurred on the transfer of a person to another location.
Answering a question regarding failure of much-hyped telemedicine to provide help
regarding medicines through telephones and mobiles, Dr Varma said this is a different kind of initiative and he hopes it will be a success.
He added that the doctors in the national capital will only suggest treatment, final call will be taken by the local doctor treating the patient.
