ASIA’S FIRST MONTHLY MAGAZINE ON THE ENTERPRISE OF HEALTHCARE
VOLUME 12 / ISSUE 01 / JANUARY 2017 / ` 75 / US $10 / ISSN 0973-8959
Newsmakers:
Measuring the Pulse of 2016 Cover Story:
Immunotherapy: Unravelling the Magic Within Dr SAJJAN RAJPUROHIT
Medical Oncologist, Rajiv Gandhi Cancer Institute & Research Centre, New Delhi
ASIA’S FIRST MONTHLY MAGAZINE ON THE ENTERPRISE OF HEALTHCARE Volume 12
Issue 01
January 2017
EDITOR-IN-CHIEF: Dr Ravi Gupta EDITORIAL TEAM - DELHI/NCR Sr. Assistant Editor: Souvik Goswami, Gautam Debroy Assistant Editor: Sandeep Datta, Vivek Ratnakar Senior Correspondent: Manish Arora, Shivani Tyagi BANGALORE BUREAU Associate Editor: T Radha Krishna MUMBAI BUREAU Senior Assistant Editor: Kartik Sharma Correspondent: Poulami Chakraborty, Harshal Yashwant Desai JAIPUR BUREAU Senior Assistant Editor: Kartik Sharma CHANDIGARH BUREAU Assistant Editor: Priya Yadav LUCKNOW BUREAU Assistant Editor: Arpit Gupta HYDERABAD BUREAU Senior Correspondent: Sudheer Goutham B AHMEDABAD BUREAU Assistant Editor: Hemangini S Rajput SALES & MARKETING TEAM: eHEALTH Product Head: Fahim Haq, Mobile: +91-8860651632 Senior Executive: Nilender Kumar, Mobile: +91-8860635837 SUBSCRIPTION & CIRCULATION TEAM Manager Subscriptions: +91-8860635832, subscription@elets.in DESIGN TEAM Creative Heads: Pramod Gupta, Anjan Dey Deputy Art Director: Om Prakash Thakur, Gopal Thakur, Shyam Kishore Senior Graphic Designer: Pradeep G EVENT TEAM Assistant Manager: Amit Yadav ADMINISTRATION Head Administration: Archana Jaiswal EDITORIAL & MARKETING CORRESPONDENCE
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Contents
JANUARY 2017 | VOLUME - 12 | ISSUE - 01
12 Cover Story
Unravelling the MAGIC WITHIN Immunotherapy has emerged as a potent weapon in oncologists’ armoury to combat cancer. The idea relies heavily on tweaking our immune system’s potency to fight cancerous cells. - Dr Sajjan Rajpurohit Medical Oncologist, Rajiv Gandhi Cancer Institute & Research Centre, New Delhi
16 Newsmakers of 2016
Measuring the Pulse of 2016
Exhibiting renewed confidence, the Indian healthcare sector is poised to break growth barriers in 2017 given a favourable policy environment and challenges that only seem to further strengthen the industry’s resolve to enhance quality to become competitive globally.
40 Outlook 2017
Big Plans on the ANVIL The year 2017 is set to herald a new growth phase in the Indian healthcare sector. Riding on the back of innovation, disruptive approach and strategic tie-ups to take on multitude of challenges, the health industry is expected to remain on the growth trajectory.
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Industry View
Newsmakers of 2016 54
24
S Kalyanaraman General Manager-Key Accounts CURA Healthcare Pvt Ltd
60
Ramakanth Desai CEO Curespring
62
Anil Gidwani Director-Pharma Business Dana Pharmaceuticals Pvt Ltd
Dr. Mandar Kulkarni CTO Cancer Genetics Inc.
22
Dr Jitendar Kumar Sharma Director & CEO AMTZ Limited
38
Neha Rastogi Co-founder Agatsa
46
32
Dr Shankar Narang COO Paras Healthcare
44
Dr Sajan Nair Group COO Zydus Hospitals Pvt Ltd
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Corporate Interview 28
26
Dr Nandakumar Jairam GMD & Chairman Columbia Asia Hospitals Pallavi Jain MD Krsnaa Diagnostics
30
Dr RK Mani Group CEO Nayati Healthcare & Research
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34
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Ananth Thyagarajan Chief Executive Officer Cittabase Solutions
Assessing Climate Change Impact on
PUBLIC HEALTH Prof. Rakesh Kapoor Director SGPGIMS
Dr K Hari Prasad President Apollo Hospitals Group
Dr Mayank Somani CEO Medics Super Speciality Hospital
56 Public Health
JANUARY / 2017 ehealth.eletsonline.com
9
editorial
Optimism Galore in Health Industry Heralding the New Year 2017, the Indian health industry looks poised to continue its successful run. The early signs of an action-packed year are already visible as Indian healthcare companies build on a solid foundation laid during the last year. However, as the industry surges ahead to explore new possibilities, it is crucial to take a look into the bygone year with all its challenges and opportunities -- some of which were realised while others missed. Cancer has emerged as a major public healthcare challenge in India, with 14-15 lakh new cancer cases being reported each year in the country. Today, innovative approaches to provide quality cancer care have become a cornerstone of oncology. It is against this backdrop that the January edition of eHealth magazine highlights how efforts are ongoing to enhance immunity towards cancer. The cover story ‘Unravelling the Magic Within’ underscores the strength of immunotherapy in offering groundbreaking results in the fight against cancer. Our special story ‘Newsmakers of 2016:Measuring the Pulse of 2016’ talks about how healthcare firms successfully rode on the robust primary markets in 2016. The high growth potential of healthcare delivery companies generated a high-level of interest among private equity firms and overseas investors, with the year witnessing over a billion-dollar inbound acquisition in the pharmaceuticals segment. We have also carried interviews of some of the game-changers of the industry to get their perspective on how fruitful the last year proved for them and how they plan to expand their offerings in 2017. The special feature ‘Outlook for 2017: Big Plans on the Anvil’ highlights that the Indian healthcare sector, riding on the back of innovation, disruptive approach and strategic tie-ups, is all set to take on a multitude of challenges and continue to remain on the growth trajectory in 2017. It highlights the big future plans of some of the major industry players as also their expectations from the Government on the policy front to propel growth of the Indian health sector. We hope the ‘Industry Views’ in the 12th anniversary edition of the magazine will offer our readers a new insight into various segments of the health industry, helping them to keep innovating for an improved healthcare delivery in India. Looking forward to our readers’ valuable feedback.
Dr Ravi Gupta Editor-in-Chief
ravi.gupta@elets.in
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Unravelling the
MAGIC WITHIN I
magine a scene from the 1978 Hollywood flick Piranhas where a school of ferocious piranhas are hell bent on sucking out the very life out of a bather in South America’s Amazon River. Now, scale it down to millions of times to molecular level and imagine a host of viruses, bacteria and parasites attacking our cells to cause life-threatening diseases. But here is the catch. While the bather in Amazon may not be so lucky as to be able to defend himself from the deadly fish, our body’s magical shield, called immune system, straightaway swings into action to kill the potentially damaging foreign bodies. References to our body’s immune system — a collection of structures and processes within the body -- are as old as the human civilisation itself. Athenian historian and general Thucydides, who survived the Plague of Athens in 430 BC, points out in his ‘His-
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Immunotherapy has emerged as a potent weapon in oncologists’ armoury to combat cancer, says Dr Sajjan Rajpurohit, a leading Medical Oncologist with over 10 years of experience in helping people revive the body’s magical immune system to fight the deadly disease, in an interview with Vivek Ratnakar of Elets News Network (ENN). Excerpts:
tory of the Peloponnesian War’ that people who had previously contracted the disease and recovered could help treat the sick without falling ill a second time. There exists a huge body of work on immunity which was exploited by the likes of Louis Pasteur, Robert Koch, Paul Ehrlich and Elie Metchnikoff, the founder of cellular immunology, to make great advances in the field. However despite all the strengths of the body’s immune system, when it comes to combating cancer, which in Latin means “crab or creeping ulcer” and was earlier applied to tumours because the swollen veins around them resembled the limbs of a crab, things start to change as cancer cells -- being the altered self-cells -- escape it and continue to grow uncontrollably. “Tumour cells are unique in the sense that they are body’s own cells but the body’s check mechanism is un-
able to control them. So, when a person develops cancer, it means that his own body cells change into a type which grow abnormally, uninterrupted and use body’s own resources to drive their growth. It has a harmful effect on the body by sucking out all the energy towards their growth and not only they grow locally but also spread to other parts of the body and disrupt the other body functions,” says Dr Sajjan Rajpurohit, a renowned specialist in medical oncology with a keen focus on immunotherapy and celluar therapy for cancer. “Our immunity fights against bacteria, viruses and fungi by recognising them as foreign bodies different from normal cells. But cancer cells mask themselves with normal cells to escape immunity. This phenomenon has been known for many years and it is also known that people with low immunity develop more cancers like people on steroids or post-transplant patients,” he adds. Efforts have been ongoing for many years to enhance immunity towards cancer, according to Dr Rajpurohit. “But till now we have not been able to make a breakthrough. The specific immunity in the body is by T cells, which are the main source of direct killing of foreign body.” After over two decades of untiring efforts to understand how tumours escape the body’s immune system and how to use our own immunity to fight cancer cells, groundbreaking results are being seen in many small but landmark studies. The impact seems so promising that The Science magazine has labelled this approach as the Breakthrough of the Year 2013. Dr Rajpurohit recalls a case that bears a testimony to how immunotherapy for cancer can be the next big thing in combating the disease. “In August 2015, a case of 56 years old gentleman, a chronic heavy smoker who had been smoking at least one to two packs of cigarettes for the last 30 years, was presented to me. He was having blood in the sputum, weight loss and cough for the last six weeks, and there was some degree of backache. He was referred to me by a chest physician who suspected a lesion in the x-ray.” Dr Rajpurohit evaluated him and got the PET-CT scan done, which showed there was a large lesion in the right lung and there were metastases in bones and the liver. He was confirmed to have lung cancer. “We started giving him chemotherapy and after three cycles of chemotherapy, he started responding to the treatment. But after six cycles of chemotherapy, his condition worsened.” By that time a new class of drugs was introduced in the market, which might have been effective in such cases. “So, I got his marker tested for immunotherapy and he was found to possess a strong positivity, indicating that he might get benefitted by immunotherapy.” Drugs were procured from overseas because at that time the drug was not available in India. Dr Rajpurohit started his treatment in February last year. “After three doses of the drug, he showed significant improvement and after six doses of the drug he was almost like a healthy person. He regained
13
Cover Story
his weight, his bone pain had disappeared and coughing seized. He is now enjoying a normal life,” says Dr Rajpurohit, who has been trained in cancer treatment at Rajiv Gandhi Cancer Institute, Tata Memorial Hospital and MD Anderson Cancer Center Houston, Texas. As a result of the clinical cancer research, more people are surviving cancer than ever before. According to Dr Rajpurohit, the current survival rate has double over the last two decades. “Patients are being identified with cancer at an early stage leading to higher cure rates and patients with advanced stage (3rd and 4th) are leading healthier lives compared to before,” he says.
The Global Evolution of Immunotherapy
The idea of using immunotherapy to treat cancer relies heavily on tweaking our immune system’s potency to fight cancerous cells. But understanding how exactly they evade detection and ways to make them ‘visible’ to the immune system is the subject of recent researches to make it
As per the statistics, there are 14-15 lakh new cancer patients each year in India. In accordance with this fact, the focus should be on its prevention. We also need to make sure that the care we provide offers real value to our patients and we should put in an effort to improve the affordability and quality of medical care.
work, Dr Rajpurohit points out. The early steps were taken by cancer immunologist James Allison, now at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, which is also the alma mater of Dr Rajpurohit. In the late 1980s, French researchers who weren’t thinking about cancer at all identified a new protein receptor on the surface of T cells, called cytotoxic T-lymphocyte antigen 4 or CTLA-4. Allison found that CTLA-4 puts the brakes on T cells, and prevents them from launching all-out immune attacks. He wondered whether blocking the blocker, the CTLA-4 molecule, would set the immune system free to destroy cancer. CTLA-4 was discovered in 1987. In 1996, Allison published a paper in the Science describing that antibodies against CTLA-4 erased tumors in mice. It took more than a decade to bring this approach from bench to bedside. The Japanese biologists working on immune system discovered a molecule expressed in dying T cells, which they called programmed death 1, or PD-1.Oncologist Drew Pardoll at the Johns Hopkins University, thought of the approach of using own T cells against the cancer cells. He tied up with Medarex to test this antibody. Last two years have seen more than a dozen of these potent T cell stimulating antiboidies entering large clinical trials with many getting breakthrough approval in cancers of lung, head and neck, colon, Iymphoma and Melanoma. For years, Steven Rosenberg at the National Cancer Institute had harvested T cells that had migrated into tumors, expanded them in the lab, and reinfused them into patients, saving some with dire prognoses. The technique worked only when doctors could access tumour tissue, though, limiting its application. In 2010, Rosenberg published encouraging results from so-called chimeric antigen receptor therapy, or CAR therapy, a personalised treatment that involved genetically modifying a patient’s T cells to make them target tumour cells. Carl June and his team at the University of Pennsylvania, reported eye-catching responses to CAR therapy: patients with pounds of leukemia that melted away. At a meeting in New Orleans, June’s team and researchers at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York reported that the T-cell therapy in their studies put 45 of 75 adults and children with leukemia into complete remission, although some later relapsed.
Indian Scenario
“As per the statistics, there are 14-15 lakh new cancer patients each year in India. In accordance with this fact, the focus should be on its prevention. We also need to make sure that the care we provide offers real value to our patients and we should put in an effort to improve the affordability and quality of medical care. The National Cancer Control Programme should be change-driven in terms of attitude and practice
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FRESH APPROACHES IN IMMUNOTHERAPY Adoptive T Cell Therapy (ACT It is a promising and rapidly advancing form of immunotherapy that overcomes tolerance by harnessing the natural ability of immune cells to recognise and eliminate target cells in order to generate durable anti-tumour immune responses. Adoptive T cell therapy involves the infusion of externally manipulated T cells. TIL Therapy It involves extracting lymphocytes from tumour tissue, ex-vivo expansion with IL-2 followed by reinfusion. A recent pooled analysis of TIL protocols reported a 20% complete response rate and a 70% overall objective response rate in patients with melanoma. Chimeric Antigen Receptors (CARs) CARs offer one of the most promising strategies that includes an extracellular antibody single-chain variable region joined with the intracellular portion of a TCR. CARs are unique in that they combine the cytotoxic activity of a CD8+ T cell with the highly avid and MHC-independent antigen recognition capacity of high-affinity monoclonal antibodies. To help overcome tolerance mechanisms, second generation CARs include expression of co-stimulatory signaling domains in addition to the CAR. Anti-tumour Antibodies Monoclonal antibodies (mAb) directed against tumour associated antigens like CD20 and HER-2, are a standard of care treatment in many malignancies. This technology was facilitated by the simultaneous understanding of antibody structure and the application of hybridoma technology, leading to a Nobel Prize for Jerne, Kohler, and Milstein in 1984.
with regards to cancer detection and management,” says Dr Rajpurohit. Despite numerous advances in medicine, according to a 1999 report on cancer occurrence in India it was estimated that more than 50 per cent of the total number of cancer cases were reported among women. The crude incidence of cancer in India is approximately 100 per 100,000 people. Recent epidemiological studies done at the National Cancer Registry programme in India report that cancer burden in the country is 2.5 to 3 million. “Corrective steps like cancer screening programme should become a part of health awareness camps. There is a need to create awareness among physicians to facilitate early referral to cancer centers for improved outcomes,” adds Dr Rajpurohit. All the treatments are available in India. There is no need to go to any foreign destination, according to him.
New Immunotherapy Approaches
Although the common treatment modalities, such as surgery and/or chemo and radiotherapies, play major roles in bringing down the mortality and morbidity to a significant extent, complete cure is still uncertain and the prognosis varies depending upon the stage and the type of the disease. Even when patients experience tumour regression immediately after therapy, recurrence or metastasis (spreading to other parts of the body) can occur later. Immunotherapies have the potential to be used to fight cancer by either applying an external stimulus to the immune system to make it act more “smarter”, or by providing the immune system with man-made or naturally-derived tumor specific proteins made outside of the body so
that the immune system can recognise the tumour as a foreign entity and destroy it. “Efforts have been ongoing for many years to enhance immunity against cancer but till now we have not been able to make a breakthrough. The main immunity in the body is through T cells. They are the direct source of killing the foreign body. How do these tumour cells interact with them? They have their expression of some molecule on the surface, which is known as PDL1 – Programmed Death Ligand 1. They programme the death of T cell. We have developed antibodies against PD or PDL1 which kills the T cells. We have made antibodies which blocks the interaction of T cells with PDL and PDL1. In this way, T cells don’t die. This has happened recently. This is our key achievement. They are called PDL1 antibody. They make the T cell active,” says Dr Rajpurohit. Scientists have also been able to genetically engineer T cells. “We take T cells out of the body and insert new receptors in them, which activates the T cells against the tumour cells. These are called CAR T cells. It is a breakthrough in blood cancer. Children who were left untreated are getting treated due to this new technology. It is a big success. The only challenge is that we are not able to mass produce this technology on bigger scale,” adds the leading oncologist, as he briefs about the new class of drugs which is highly effective in fighting cancer. Many of these new classes of drugs are available in India. The ones which are not available in the country can easily be procured, according to Dr Rajpurohit. “Cost is the only limitation for these new class of drugs. But realizing their benefits, the government too is proactively looking to bring the cost down. In the next five years, their cost will definitely come down,” he says.
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Newsmakers of 2016
Exhibiting renewed confidence, the Indian healthcare sector is poised to break growth barriers in 2017 given a favourable policy environment and challenges that only seem to further strengthen the industry’s resolve to enhance quality to become competitive globally. Elets News Network (ENN) takes a look at how 2016 shaped up for the Indian healthcare sector and how some of the newsmakers in the industry pushed the quality of healthcare delivery in the country to the next level.
Measuring the Pulse of
2016
T
he bygone year was an action-packed year for the Indian Healthcare industry. Exhibiting strong confidence in their capabilities to scale new heights, several Indian healthcare companies in pharmaceutical, diagnostics businesses, multispecialty hospital chains, an oncology chain, successfully rode the primary market wave by launching their initial public offerings (IPOs). The acquisition and merger scenario, too, saw a lot of action happening with China’s Shanghai Fosun Pharmaceutical Co striking a $1.4-billion deal with Gland Pharma Limited to acquire 86 per cent stake in the Hyderabad-based company. The high growth potential of healthcare delivery companies generated a high level of interest among private equity firms, as several Indian pharma majors closed strategic deals in domestic as well as overseas market. The single-specialty sector including hospital chains in
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eye care, mother and child care, dental care and oncology segments attracted good investments, even as multispecialty hospital chains like Hyderabad-based CARE Hospitals raised funds to further their expansion plans to improve healthcare delivery across the country. The end of regulatory uncertainty with regard to in-vitro fertilisation (IVF) also significantly improved investment environment with PE investments beginning to flow into the promising segment. The Indian healthcare tech startups continued to show traction with 73 deals worth over $113 million struck, highlighting the future potential of disruptive thinking in healthcare delivery. Despite facing opposition, online pharmacies, too, attracted significant investments as the government initiated the process of setting clear regulatory guidelines to regulate them.
Newsmakers of 2016
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Newsmakers Newsmakers of 2016 of 2016
KEY IPOS IN HEALTHCARE SECTOR Name of Company Syngene International Dr Lal PathLabs Alkem Laboratories Narayana Hrudayalaya Healthcare Global Enterprises Thyrocare Technologies Laurus Labs
IPO Size `550-cr `638-cr `1,350-cr `613-cr `357.30-cr `479.21-cr `1,331.79-cr
Result Over-subscribed 32 times Over-subscribed 33 times Over-subscribed 44 times Over-subscribed 9 times Over-subscribed 2 times Over-subscribed 73 times Over-subscribed 4.5 times
MAJOR DEALS IN HEALTHCARE SECTOR ● Shanghai Fosun Pharmaceutical Co striking a $1.4-billion deal with Gland Pharma Limited to acquire 86 per cent stake. ● Dr. Reddy’s Labs signs a deal with Israeli drug maker Teva, which has been divesting its assets in the US and Europe, to acquire a portfolio of eight abbreviated new drug applications (ANDA) in the US for $350 million. ● Cipla closes acquisitions of InvaGen and Exelan in a $550 million deal to bolster its presence in the US. ● Sun Pharma pays $175 million to Swiss pharmaceutical giant Novartis for rights over advanced skin cancer drug Odomzo. Besides taking cognizance of the big-ticket investments – both inbound and outbound -- and fund raising happening throughout the year, we contacted several captains of the Indian healthcare sector to know what they were able to achieve in 2016. Here is what they shared with us.
Dr Jintendar Kumar Sharma, Director & CEO of the Andhra Pradesh MedTech Zone (AMTZ) Limited and Advisor (Health), Government of Andhra Pradesh KEY ACHIEVEMENTS: ● Rationalisation of specifications to ensure competitive bidding in healthcare technology division ● Initiating equipment maintenance programme in public private partnerships for effective upkeep ● Starting medical devices adverse events reporting system in the country ● Department of Healthcare Technology at NHSRC recognised as the WHO collaborating centre for medical devices making in the entire South-East Asia ● Driving growth of Andhra Pradesh MedTech Zone (AMTZ), India’s first medical device manufacturing zone spread over 270 acres in Visakhapatnam
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Dr Mayank Somani, CEO, Medics Super Speciality Hospital KEY ACHIEVEMENTS: ● Driving the upcoming state-of-the-art 300-bed super speciality tertiary care hospital, the first in Lucknow and whole central and eastern UP ● Tied up with doctors, pharmaceutical companies and bigger NGOs to ensure inclusive quality healthcare is provided to all irrespective of their social status ● Guiding development of a strong IT infrastructure and the best technology in the healthcare space to make healthcare delivery and work flow seamlessly
Newsmakers of 2016
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ϱϬн ŚŽƐƉŝƚĂůƐ ϭϬн ĚŝĂŐŶŽƐƚŝĐ ůĂďƐ What is the mission of Curespring for bringing quality healthcare access universal and affordable? Our goal is to address the issues of access to a specialist doctor, optimum utilisation of his/her time, enable evidence-based treatment and reduced cost to patient for specialist care. Curespring (cloudbased connected health platform) enables establishing a specialist doctors’
connected healthcare delivery: • Base Curespring platform • We have integrated Curespring with our HIS package, enabling remote consultation for hospital patients. We are enhancing HIS to offer hospital performance analysis, integration with other diagnostic apps and mobile enablement – IP Case sheet &
enables real-time consultation amongst doctors and hence enhances quality of care for patients. Technology enables optimum utilisation of specialist doctors’ time. Technology enables connecting JANUARY / 2017 all stakeholders (diagnostics/providers, ehealth.eletsonline.com medical devices, doctors and patients) on one platform and hence clinical pathways are feasible by ensuring consistency of treatment.
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Newsmakers of 2016
Dr Nand Kumar Jairam, CMD, Columbia Asia Hospitals
Dr Shankar Narang, Chief Operating Officer, Paras Healthcare
KEY ACHIEVEMENTS: ● Expanding super speciality services like Liver Transplantation, Bone Marrow Transplantation, Deep Brain Stimulation, High-end Urology, High-end Neurosurgical procedures, etc. ● Establishing centres of excellence (CoE) around specialties like kidney transplant, gastric and liver diseases and orthopedics ● Standardising clinical terminologies through the adoption of SNOMED CT for all the procedures and also the adoption of ICD 10 for diagnoses ● Successfully running 100-bed hospitals in Tier-II towns like Patiala, Mysore and Ghaziabad. ● Plans to commission 206-bed hospital in Sarjapur, Bangalore during the fourth quarter of the 2017. Plans are also afoot to expand in the Pune area as well
Key Achievements: ● Positioning Paras Healthcare as a community player with stress on accessibility, affordability and quality ● Providing specialties based on regional needs. ● Driving the hospital chain’s expansion strategy that has been broken into two phases -- Phase 1 is from 2015 to 2020 and Phase 2 from 2021 to 2028. Expansion will primarily be in Tier 2 cities of North India.
Neha Rastogi, Co-founder of Agatsa
Dr Sajan Nair, Group COO, Zydus Hospitals & Healthcare Research Pvt Ltd Key Achievements: ● cGreen OT, NABH and NABL accreditions in 18 months of operations ● Coming up with full-fledged radiation centre and oncology unit with latest technology in partnership with reputed oncology institute of US/Europe ● Plans to set up seven hospitals -- five in major cities of Gujarat, one each in Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan ● Plans to tie up with like-minded hospitals in tier-II and III cities across India and in Africa ● Executed 214 community-based educational programmes as part of its CSR initiative ● Robust medical tourism programme for foreigners and NRIs
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Key Achievements: ● Launching disruptive tech-driven devices to make cardiac care simple and cost-effective ● Launching Sanket, a credit card sized ECG monitoring device, which measures 12-lead ECGs without any leads or wires or electrodes ● Plans to launch a complete range of end-to-end solutions for cardiac care by bringing together cardiac healthcare providers, dieticians and physical therapists ● Gearing up to Beta launch of cardiac health platform called “Sanket Coach Programme.”
Newsmakers of 2016
JANUARY / 2017 ehealth.eletsonline.com
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Newsmakers of 2016
Leading the
HEALTHCARE REVOLUTION
Having led several key projects and health technology initiatives and research in leading institutions from New Delhi’s All India Institute of Medical Science to World Health Organisation-Switzerland, Dr Jitendar Kumar Sharma, Director & CEO of the AMTZ Limited and Advisor (Health), Government of Andhra Pradesh, is a force to reckon with when it comes to guiding the ongoing healthcare revolution in the country. In an interview with Elets News Network (ENN), Dr Sharma speaks in detail on how medical technology landscape in India is witnessing a paradigm shift, his personal contribution to make it possible besides the ways to harness the “cumulative potential of health as well as medical technology”.
As a healthcare leader with experience in supporting the entire range of healthcare delivery systems from a primary health centre to World Health Organisation, how do you plan to change the health and medical technology landscape in India?
Medical technology landscape in a country can change for better only with coherent synergies of a large number of individuals, agencies and institutions. However, for it to change, we will also need to philosophically find the convergence between service delivery and industry promotion. These are generally seen as two distinct activities. However, the reality is that service delivery fuels consumption which is the core of demand generation and industry promotion. Similarly, balanced industry promotion with judicious use of resources could make service delivery more affordable. What we intend doing is to connect these two paradigms to harness the cumulative potential of
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health as well as medical technology.
You have done pioneering work for establishing medical devices testing laboratories in India, initiating programme for tracking of medical devices adverse event and other such projects. Please provide us a brief overview of your key achievements in the field of healthcare.
My role as the head of healthcare technology division started with rationalisation of specifications to ensure competitive bidding. Thereafter, we started the equipment maintenance programme in public private partnerships for effective upkeep. This has been a unique and highly successful programme which has increased the upkeep time of available medical equipment as well as initiated a large market for spares and accessories. In parallel, reports were drafted for setting up of first dedicated medical devices testing laboratories in which we played a crucial technical role.
Efforts were also made to start the medical devices adverse events reporting system in the country which was taken by Indian Pharmacopoeia Commission with support of SreeChitraTirunal Institute of Medical Sciences & Technology. Fortunately, the Department of Healthcare Technology at NHSRC was recognised as the WHO collaborating centre for medical devices making it the only med tech centre of such recognition in the entire South-East Asia.
In your role as the CEO of Andhra Pradesh MedTech Zone Ltd, what are the opportunities in the offing for the Indian equipment manufacturers at this first of its kind facility in Asia?
The creation of Andhra Pradesh MedTech Zone (AMTZ) is based on the fact that medical devices manufacturing requires certain high investment facilities which are too capital intensive for individual manufactures
Newsmakers of 2016
to invest upon. A park with in-house high investment scientific facilities would help manufacturers reduce the cost of manufacturing. While the park would have all such facilities in-house to reduce manufacturing process costs, it would have state-of-the-art 250-300 independent manufacturing units, each over a built-in ready to use area in 1 acre, 0.50 acre or 0.25acre at a very cost effective long term lease rate for 33 years. Located in an area which is well connected with railways, roadways, waterways and airways with near presence of industrial corridors, port and harbour to reduce logistical costs, AMTZ in Visakhapatnam is India’s first medical device manufacturing zone spread over 270 acres.
What are the key challenges you have been facing in implementing the AMTZ project?
There are no challenges that cannot be resolved with effective partnerships with stakeholders. In AMTZ, the tremendous support of manufacturers and scientific service providers has made our journey effortless.
The creation of Andhra Pradesh MedTech Zone (AMTZ) is based on the fact that medical devices manufacturing requires certain high investment facilities which are too capital intensive for individual manufactures to invest upon. A park with inhouse high investment scientific facilities would help manufacturers reduce the cost of manufacturing.
and a plethora of such pro-public initiatives are creating the right balance of access, supply and partnerships required a bubbling healthcare eco-system. We are striving now to achieve the right balance between involvement of public health institutions in core clinical activities and undertaking strategic purchasing of non-core clinical functions such as equipment maintenance and the like.
How technology can aid healthcare for all?
Technology is the sole strategy that can democratise skills and resources available in the country for optimum healthcare outcomes.
What are the key issues being faced by the Indian medical equipment manufacturers? How can these be resolved?
The two issues faced by the Indian medical equipment manufacturers are perhaps – support to meet quality benchmarks, and non-tariff barriers such as near absence of medical device regulations. Fortunately, while AIMED and Quality Council of India have come up with IC-MED which is a voluntary certification scheme, appropriate authorities with Government of India are putting all efforts to put in regulatory regime in place.
Please share your views on inclusive healthcare in India. How government is involved in making this a reality?
Recent launch of National Diagnostics Programme including tele-radiology and CT scan facility in public hospitals, National Dialysis Programme
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Corporate Interview
Healthcare
SOLUTION
with Relevance
CURA Healthcare, with its comprehensive range of imaging diagnostics and critical care solutions, has been constantly evolving with changing times to offer healthcare solutions having relevance for its customers making day to day operations a pleasant experience. S Kalyanaraman, General Manager-Key Accounts (Sales and Marketing), CURA Healthcare Pvt Ltd, tells Elets News Network (ENN) about the value company’s key products and services provide to users. Please tell us how CURA Healthcare Pvt Ltd is different from other companies in the medical device market?
CURA brings “value for performance” solutions with low product ownership cost. The solutions are backed by best in class after sales service support. CURA understands local challenges well and thus is able to offer relevant solutions to the customer.
What are the key products and services that drive the company’s growth?
CURA offers a comprehensive range of imaging diagnostics and critical care solutions. In fact, we are the only Indian medtech company to offer such depth and breadth of solutions. Digital radiography, mobile DR, HF x-ray, C-arm, digital and analogue mammography, BMD, fluoroscopy, thermal mammography, ultrasound and colour doppler makes up imaging diagnostic portfolio. In critical care, we offer complete range of patient monitoring system, defibrillator, ECG, pulse oximeter, stress test system, dialyzer reprocessor, bicarbonate mixer, etc.
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Which latest technologies you incorporate in your offerings to help improve the quality of healthcare delivery?
Our technologies address the infrastructure and other challenges faced by the customer in his day to day operations. Be it ultrasound, digital radiography, x-ray, or critical care solutions, our technology serve them with relevance. We have designed and developed Digital Radiography systems which works at 15amps and still offer power to do all applications. This allows the system to be used without need of high electricity power requirement. The system works even without power.
What are your expansion plans in near future? How do you see yourself evolving in 2017?
Product and geographic expansion is in the anvil. We have received CE accreditation for our DR system and shortly will receive CE certificate for critical care products. With this, we will be able to penetrate emerging markets. We see great opportunities to grow and aim to become a Rs 500 crore company in the next couple of years.
How had been 2016 in terms of growth for the Indian medical device sector?
Medical equipment market in India is entering an age of democratisation as power shifts from hospitals, doctors and other care givers to patients, potentially leading to dramatic healthcare improvement. The market has been growing consistently over the last few years regardless of global recession.
Which technological trends you saw evolving in 2016, which you see have potential to impact the medical device market?
More than technological advancement, it is cost optimisation model which is the on-going trend and will extend in 2017 also. MNCs and Indian medical equipment manufacturers are working on solutions which are more relevant to India’s tier-II, III and rural markets than urban cities. As the market is shifting towards tier-II, tier-III cities and rural India, we need to understand the challenges users face to offer relevant solutions. Moreover, change in business models, service support models, financing structure, etc will play significant role in deciding the outcome.
Corporate Interview
DIAGNOSTICS for Masses
Krsnaa Diagnostics, one of the fastest growing diagnostics chains in India, has developed a strong network across the country through various social and charitable activities in the field of healthcare. Pallavi Jain, MD, Krsnaa Diagnostics, in conversation with Elets News Network, highlights the quality services offered by her organisation at affordable prices to the masses. What are the guiding principles driving the growth of Krsnaa Diagnostics?
Our vision and aim at Krsnaa Diagnostics has always been to provide quality healthcare at affordable prices and reaching out to as many people as we can in the rural India. Diagnosis plays a crucial role in evidence-based treatments, but since it is extremely expensive for majority of the people we look forward to offer diagnostic services at affordable prices. Having gained the confidence of patients and clients, we have embarked on an expansion programme to make our services available across the country through public private partnership mode. We have also partnered with various government, private medical colleges and hospitals to provide our services.
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With so many diagnostic chains operating in the country, how do you differentiate yourself as a quality healthcare provider?
Firstly, for us quality is the key. We use high-end equipment with latest technology in partnership with GE Medical Systems, ROCHE, Lilac, Horiba, Mindray, etc, to provide unparalleled diagnostic services. Secondly, we offer our services across the country at almost the same price. We are available in 10 states and across 1,400 plus locations providing services 24/7 throughout the year delivering quality healthcare to the masses. Krsnaa has so far reported over 10 lakh scans and has a team of 70 radiologist on its panel. At Krsnaa Diagostics, we have a tradition of offering services at the same rates without applying any kind of extra charges. To meet quality standards, we always adopt the latest technology and equipment. Likewise, in the MRI segment, our machines range from 0.2 Tesla to latest 3 Tesla machine and Single Slice CT to 128 slice CT scanners. Krsnaa provides services to patients across district hospitals, CHCs and primary health centres and private hospitals, including corporate tie ups. We have made sure our team includes experts and reliable members to monitor and assure accurate diagnosis at competitive pricing. All Krsnaa centres have well trained staff who make it their mission to lay
We have embarked on an expansion programme to make our services available across the country through public private partnership mode ample stress on empathy and hand holding, making patients feel comfortable and at ease.
What’s new in the imaging technology space that you as a company aspire to adopt to improve healthcare delivery?
Krsnaa has always believed in adapting the latest technologies and we have customised solutions for various sectors. Adapting with high end solutions, real time monitoring, safety analysis, R&D helps us improvise and upgrade our offerings to our clients and patients.
Where do you see yourself fiveyears down the line? Please share your future goals.
Krsnaa has its current presence in 10 States which includes Jammu, Himachal Pradesh, Odisha, Madhya Pradesh, Gujrat, Andhra Pradesh, Maharshtra, UttarPradesh, Tamilnadu and further plans to expand in rest of the country with a aim to provide Quality Health care at affordable prices.
Corporate Interview
PIONEERING ACCESS to Quality Healthcare
Taking tertiary healthcare to Tier-II cities and smaller towns of India, Nayati Healthcare has pioneered a revolution that promises to provide mass access to quality health services in the interiors of the country, says Dr RK Mani, Group CEO Medical and Chairman, Critical Care, Pulmonology and Sleep Medicine, Nayati Healthcare & Research in an interview with Elets News Network (ENN). Excerpts: How is tertiary healthcare scenario getting transformed in smaller cities and towns of India?
Quality tertiary care is an unmet need in the smaller cities and towns of India. Over the years, the primary and secondary levels of healthcare have grown but proportionate evolution at the tertiary level of care has not taken place over vast regions, especially in the interiors of the country. In these regions, there is at best unorganised and patchy development of
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Corporate Interview
super specialty care. As tertiary care is concentrated mainly in big cities and metros, patients in the interiors have to cover long distances in order to access emergency services, critical care, cancer care, cardiac, gastrointestinal, renal, orthopedics, mother and child care and other medical and surgical services. A radical reform in our healthcare strategy is required to raise the level of healthcare in these regions, virtually from the scratch.
How Nayati Healthcare is involved in changing the healthcare delivery system in India?
The premise for setting up of Nayati Healthcare was to fill the gap in the healthcare space that had surfaced due to the lack of organised healthcare in tier-II&III cities of India. To raise the level, particularly upto the tertiary referral care, Nayati focuses on smaller cities in Northern India. The flagship 351-bed super specialty hospital was started in Mathura and a chain of such hospitals is on the anvil going forward. This initiative should start the transformation and rapidly reduce the widening urban-rural healthcare gap in the country.
Please tell us about your key offerings for the healthcare sector and how these are driving the company’s growth.
Our offerings include setting up of tertiary level healthcare facilities to provide comprehensive care with all specialties under one roof. This model has been adopted because of interdependence of specialty departments and because in smaller cities and towns standalone facilities would not be able to meet the overall needs. Our charity wing, through well equipped mobile medical units have taken primary care to more than 4 lac patients into the rural interiors of the Western UP region. Through community activities we have taken initiatives to raise awareness of Health and Wellness as well. Answering to these felt needs would certainly extend our presence and our opportunities for meaningful contribution to the overall development of the region. We believe that with a world class hospital in Mathu-
ra, medical tourism can extend to the interiors of the country as there is substantial pilgrims traffic in Brajbhoomi.
Which key opportunities you see emerging in the healthcare space in India?
Poor access to healthcare by a large proportion of the population has been a challenge that has also brought great opportunities on several fronts. Besides extending access to quality healthcare infrastructure and reducing the barriers to delivery, I foresee a return of trained medical, nursing and paramedical personnel from the big metros to smaller towns and cities of India. It would also improve the
There are new opportunities for disseminating healthcare education where there has been none, thereby improving the scope of modern healthcare retention of medical trainees in the region seeking advanced experience and training. New data and patient care experience in research would enrich professionals personally and healthcare information in general. There are new opportunities for disseminating healthcare education where there has been none. Lastly, there is opportunity to address the issue of cost and inclusivity through fiscal efficiency and extending the penetration of health insurance.
Please tell us about the major challenges faced by healthcare providers like Nayati in making healthcare affordable and more inclusive.
Access to quality healthcare has been denied for millions by reasons of geographic distances, availability of expertise and affordability. Experience in Mathura showed us first hand the
high density of disease burden in the region. It confirmed our estimate that the region would need all specialities under one roof. Providing quality intensive care in a manner that the local population finds it affordable has been a major challenge. To balance the cost of setting up of infrastructure and cost of personnel against affordability is another challenge. Economy of scale should be the basis of improving affordability. For this purpose, reaching out to the communities to build relationships of trust and raising their awareness of new facilities now within their reach and being able to deliver end-to-end healthcare solutions have been the most important challenges. The other major challenge has been to bring together top professionals in full-time capacity to pursue careers in Mathura because local availability, especially of super specialists, is scarce. Of course this is also an opportunity to train professionals settled in the region who do not have easy access to continuing medical education. This would contain the exodus of such personnel to the big cities. It has also been a challenge to settle personnel from across India in the region and provide them quality living conditions together with educational facilities for their children. We have efficiently put together infrastructure. This means that we choose equipment and technology judiciously to avoid over-capitalisation.
How do you think India can fill the wide rural-urban divide in quality healthcare services?
Ideally in India there should be no rural-urban divide as far as healthcare is concerned because we have an obligation to provide healthcare equitably, irrespective of the region or the socio economic strata. In my opinion the existing rural-urban divide can be bridged by breaking the barriers of accessibility mentioned above. I think the initiatives taken by Nayati are extremely significant because we are among the first to take treatment directly to those who need it most.
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Corporate Interview
PRECURSOR of Change
Apollo came up with the idea of starting the first multi-specialty emergency centre when there was no concept of emergency healthcare services in the country. Apollo as a group has been and will be dedicated in improving the healthcare facilities in India, says Dr K Hari Prasad, President-Apollo Hospitals Group, in conversation with Sudheer Goutham of Elets News Network (ENN). Please tell us about the steps taken by Apollo in terms of emergency services.
Twenty-one years ago there was no concept of emergency healthcare in the country. Back then it was known as casualty. If a patient visited the hospital, he or she was just referred to the respective department. In between these referral processes a lot of precious time was lost and unfortunately the critical patient had to bear the consequences. Dr Prathap C. Reddy (Founder-Chairman of Apollo Hospitals) then came up with an idea of starting emergency services. In 1996, the first multi-specialty emergency service was launched by Apollo. We started the first accidental specialty hospital at Kavadi Guda in Hyderabad. Because there were no specialty back then, there were lack of dedicated professionals/technicians and ambu-
lances to support this initiative. That point of time we got support from a group of doctors. We were round the clock dedicated to the emergency services and whenever there was a call from the patient’s end we were ready for service. We made eight emergency rooms and all of them were interconnected. We even started an emergency helpline (1066) for providing round the clock assistance to the patients. Dr Reddy wanted us to spread the technique and open emergency centres across the country. We took the initiative and designed a specialised ambulance. We started training programmes for doctors and paramedics. We replicated this model across our group of hospitals. Several professionals, who received trainings under us are now a part of many eminent institutions. Today, the most satisfying fact is that majority of the hospitals have adopted emergency healthcare model and have even launched an emergency helpline number. This has created new vistas for healthcare professionals. Based on this success, the government also started thinking about taking initiatives in the field of emergency. Today emergency is an established specialty.
Apollo has been a leader in bringing new technology in the healthcare industry. What are your views in this regard?
Whatever new initiatives have been taken in the Indian healthcare industry, has been brought it by Apollo. We are at a stage where we are taking a lot of initiatives in improving our services. Essentially we are trying to bring in better healthcare facilities which are cost effective too. We are doing a lot of work in the field of Cancer. Some of our initiatives include Robotic Surgery: It helps the surgeon to see better and be precise on his/her technique. It is a huge advancement in the field of multiple specialties, especially for segments
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Corporate Interview
like neurology, gynecology, gastroenterology etc. Personal medicine: If four patients get a similar disease, their symptoms can be alike but the disease will have different effect on each patient. We are therefore working on personalised medicine. This technology can bring specific treatment for the patients. Preventive healthcare: If a person comes for a health check up, we design a personalised package for the checkup.
Tell us about your presence in the major cities.
We have our presence in almost all major cities in the country. Dr Reddy as a chairman believes in quality healthcare for all. So we decided that once we are done with advance healthcare in major cities, we will then concentrate on how to deal with healthcare in Tier 1 and Tier 2 cities in the country. We developed the concept of Apollo reach hospitals for Tier 1 and Tier 2 cities and these hospitals are providing services that are ad on to the already available services. We have recently inaugurated a
Dr Prathap C. Reddy (Founder-Chairman of Apollo Hospitals) came up with an idea of starting emergency services. In 1996, the first multi-specialty emergency service was launched by Apollo hospital in Mumbai. This hospital is equipped with all the advanced healthcare facilities available in the country.
Access to healthcare is still a challenge in the country. What are your plans for the rural regions?
We cannot be present everywhere. Initially, it is important to understand health care. Healthcare is divided into primary, secondary and tertiary category. Most of the people require the
primary healthcare and then they gradually move to tertiary depending on the necessity. We are essentially providing tertiary, the real hind end healthcare and secondary healthcare. In the areas we have our reach; we also have clinics and daycare surgery centres and cradles. We strongly believe that there is a need to grow but there are challenges as well. We don’t have enough trained professionals in the healthcare sector.
Kindly tell us about your projects with the government sector.
We have taken a lot of initiatives in the Public-Private Partnership. We run few hospitals in PPP model. Delhi’s Indraprastha Apollo is our partnership initiative with the Delhi Government. We are also working with the Andhra Pradesh government and running their primary health centres. Apollo has telemedicine centres in the northeastern India. We have also launched our online programme called Ask Apollo, a banquet of services with specilaised consultation.
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Newsmakers of 2016
Looking for New Horizons of GROWTH Paras Hospitals, one of the leading healthcare providers in India with focus on accessibility, affordability and quality, is looking for new horizons of growth under the leadership of Dr Shankar Narang, Chief Operating Officer, Paras Healthcare. With plans afoot to bridge the healthcare gap in Tier-II cities of North India, Dr Narang tells Elets News Network (ENN) how the group will go about it and what are the key differentiators that separate it from other leaders in the Indian healthcare space.
As the Chief Operating Officer of Paras Healthcare, what are your plans to improve operational efficiency of the group hospitals?
Paras Healthcare is a unique hospital chain that differentiates from the other healthcare providers by delivering affordable, accessible and quality care. It is an honour to be associated with the only healthcare provider in India that has been able to cross 1000 beds without any equity funding. Paras Healthcare as per the organisation vision is set to expand to number of other cities in city and abroad. As the COO it shall be my endeavour to focus on clinical structuring, operational efficiency, evidence based medicine, inclusion of the best HR based practices, quality orientation and training along with patient feedback and gap bridging. My background in operations and costing shall help me streamline the healthcare operations and set certain systems that aim at cost opti-
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misation. Man power utilisation and robust clinical protocols shall govern our policies. Patient feedback, customer relationship management and above all IT practices that can help bridge the gap between the patient and the doctors shall be introduced. We, at Paras Healthcare, strongly feel that operational efficiency is a goal set for the entire organisation; each department plays a pivotal role in ensuring the deliverance of the endeavour.
Please apprise us about the hospital group’s key achievements and its USP.
Paras Healthcare is a provider for the common man. We are positioned as community players and ensure that we always provide facilities and services based on three tenets of healthcare delivery – Accessibility, Affordability and Quality. Our endeavours have been instrumental in bridging the healthcare gap
Newsmakers of 2016
and empowering the common man with access to affordable, accessible and quality care. PARAS GURGAON – The flag ship hospital is positioned as most accessible and affordable healthcare provider. PARAS PATNA – The first corporate hospital of Bihar has been instrumental in providing specialised cancer, cardiac, ortho and kidney care facilities to the state. Largest private healthcare provider in Bihar and first to provide kidney transplant facility, bone marrow transplant unit , PET CT and 128 Slice CT Scan Facility in Bihar. PARAS DARBHANGA – The first cardiac and critical unit of Mithilanchal. The hospital has empowered the region with 24X7 specialised care in neurosciences, cardiology, ortho & trauma care. PARAS PANCHKULA – The specialised mother & child care centre is the first in the region to provide fetal medicine expertise in the Tricity. It is also the first boutique maternity care hospital to provide perinatal care. PARAS NEW DELHI – An affordable and specialised mother & child care centre that aims at providing maternity care, neonatology care along with special programs for the mother and the new born. PARAS PANCHKULA* - The first multi super specialty and cancer care hospital of the region. PARAS NOIDA*- The first green mother and child care centre of the region.
Which key services differentiate you as a healthcare provider?
We specialise in providing those specialties that the region needs. In Gurgaon we have the best neurosciences services. The team of doctors under the guidance of Dr (Prof) VS Mehta, Padmashree, provides the best neurology, neurosurgery diagnosis and treatment protocols. They are the only in the region to specialise in deep seated tumours. Other centres of excellence such as cardiology, joint replacement surgery and kidney transplant provide affordable
and quality care to the common man. In Patna, we are the first in the state to provide a comprehensive cancer care centre equipped with Bihar’s and Jharkhand’s first PET CT and latest third generation radiation technology. We also specialise in orthopedics and trauma care under Dr John Mukhopadhaya. In Darbhanga, we specialise in providing emergency care services along with cardiology, neurosciences and ortho care. In Panchkula, we specialise in providing Fetal Medicine – the only centre in the tricity that specialises in the expertise. Over the years through our due diligence and research we have been able to bridge the gap of medical services and provide super specialty care that the region needs the most.
What are your expansion plans in near future?
The expansion strategy of Paras Healthcare has been broken into two phases; Phase 1 is from 2015 to 2020 and Phase 2 is from 2021 to 2028. Expansion will primarily be in Tier 2 cities of North India. Our target is cities with a population of 2m+ that have a Medical College. The focus will be on establishing tertiary care centers that focus on oncology, cardiology, orthopedics and neurology. These will evolve into specialised transplant centres. By 2020, Paras Healthcare intends to establish tertiary healthcare facilities in other Tier-II and Tier-III cities too, to bridge the gap between demand and supply. Five years from now we will have bed strength of 1,500.
Paras Healthcare works on the principle of bridging the gap - by providing exceptional medical expertise, infrastructure and technology to areas that lack the same.
What are the key values underpinning the hospital’s vision and philosophy?
Paras Healthcare works on the principle of bridging the gap - by providing exceptional medical expertise, infrastructure and technology to areas that lack the same. Paras Healthcare through its various endeavors has been able to initiate a healthcare revolution numerous areas. Paras mainly adheres to its three tenets of healthcare – present accessibility of healthcare in the region, presence of affordable healthcare at the location and existence of a specialised quality healthcare provider.
Please tell us about some recent initiatives undertaken by the group.
Paras Healthcare has just taken the following initiatives at Paras Patna and Paras Darbhanga : ● Launched the first 128 slice CT machine in Bihar to provide exceptional radio-diagnosis ● Launched the first kidney transplant centre in Bihar ● Launched the first bone marrow transplant unit in Bihar ● Launched the first cardiac care unit in Darbhanga – equipped with the latest cath lab and cardiac surgery operation theatre. We have also announced a new multi-super speciality hospital in Panchkula – Paras Hospitals, Panchkula. Expected to commence operations within a year, this will be the first hospital in Panchkula to provide latest and most comprehensive cancer care facilities including medical, surgical, radiation and nuclear medicine services. The hospital will focus on a range of specialties including cardiac sciences (cardithoracic and vascular surgery and cath lab services), neurosciences (neurology and neurosurgery), orthopedics and joint replacement, and trauma. The coming financial year will also witness the launch of Paras Bliss, Noida - The first dedicated mother and child care facility in the city with expertise in the fields of fetal medicine and development supportive care for neonates.
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Corporate Interview
Advantage BIG DATA Analytics for
HEALTHCARE
With the advent of Big Data Analytics, many areas of healthcare which were developed and proved as scientific theories decades ago are now being put into practice, say Founding Members of Cittabase Solutions, in an interview with Elets News Network (ENN). How business intelligence and big data solutions are relevant to the Indian healthcare system? How can these technology solutions improve health delivery in India?
The healthcare enterprises in India have abundant data – data that depict their experience and data that hold the key for many of their problems. But more often than not, we find Indian healthcare enterprises so far have not attempted to dig deeper and
unravel their data to their advantage, simply because of the sheer volume and disparateness. With the advent of Big Data Analytics, many areas of healthcare which were developed and proved as scientific theories decades ago are now being put into practice. For instance, for the research fraternity, a Business Intelligence (BI) or a Big Data Analytics implementation is a great boon in making areas such as personalised medicine a reality. These were areas which were thought upon as not commercially viable before the advent of BI and Big Data Analytics. Cognitive computing systems can collect and auto-analyse vital sign readings generated by the various medical instruments and wearable devices for patients in ICU and provide intuitive alerts to care-givers on their mobile devices for the timely intervention thereby ensuring better clinical outcome.
What are the key benefits Indian healthcare providers draw from implementation of business intelligence and analytics?
MURALI PALLIKARA President Cittabase Solutions
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The current state of Indian healthcare industry is data-rich and information-poor. The primary goal of a Business Intelligence system implementation is to take charge of their data and convert it into more meaningful information and insights
that lead to strategic and timely decisions. Thus, it enables healthcare enterprise administrators to control and cut-down costs by improving operational efficiency without compromising quality of care and outcome. Secondly, by integrating clinical and financial data and by making them available side-by-side for analysis, the clinicians and administrators have the ability to assess the efficacy of the diagnosis and treatment process and compare them against their alternatives. Thirdly, to keep up the satisfaction levels of a modern day patient who is more knowledgeable and demanding than ever before, BI systems can provide the transparency and accountability that they seek. In a global context, where India is fast becoming a medical tourism destination of choice, to sustain and succeed in global competition, it is imperative for the Indian healthcare enterprises to periodically analyse the public sentiments. Big Data Analytics is a great new way to collate and integrate data available in the public domain such as social media, health forums, etc, and integrate it with their in-house data to measure and monitor their performance against patient satisfaction and sentiments. This will help to improve and maintain their standards according to the global patient’s expectation and requirements.
Corporate Interview
What does a hospital need to implement such solutions?
Unlike a decade or so ago, when healthcare analytics had just started to blossom in the developed economies, today it has become a lot more easier and cheaper to implement a BI or an Analytics solution. Over the last decade, the technologies have converged, many BI use-cases have been tested and ROI has been established. All these factors put together meant faster rollout, less expensive, low risk and highly agile enterprise-scale BI solution. We strongly recommend our clients to embark on BI solutions on a phased and foundational approach rather than a big bang one-time rollout of a mega BI solution. A team of experts comprising of healthcare business domain specialists and BI and Analytics technical specialists are critical for the implementation of a BI system. Besides that, it is the management will and support to implement a BI system and make it as the enterprise’s single-version-oftruth data repository is the most important need.
Please tell us what Cittabase is all about and also your key solutions designed for health
Unlike a decade or so ago, when healthcare analytics had just started to blossom in the developed economies, today it has become a lot more easier and cheaper to implement a BI or an Analytics solution institutions in India.
ANDREW JOSEPH Chief Product Officer Cittabase Solutions
Cittabase is a BI and Analytics company. Cittabase specialises in Healthcare Analytics space. We have successfully implemented multiple Healthcare BI Solutions. These BI solutions have been designed to integrate disparate, heterogeneous data into a single repository and present the gist of the data to the senior executives by means of dashboards and reports. Putting all that solid experience into, Cittabase has come out with a Packaged Healthcare Analytics Solution, Lifeline Analytics, intended for a healthcare institution of any size, which makes a successful BI system implementation from the ground-up, quick and easy. We have a couple of other speciality centre specific products, diabetes care – intended for a diabetes speciality centre
and oncolytics - intended for a cancer centre.
How do you see your solutions making an impact in government run institutions in India?
We have been working with public hospitals in ASEAN countries and we have a greater understanding of the challenges faced by government-run institutions. The solutions we provide can make significant impact in population health and wellness, infectious disease outbreak surveillance and control, cut down administrative costs, ability to effectively utilise scarce healthcare resource time to match demand and supply, etc.
What are your future plans for India?
Cittabase is based out of Chennai
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where it has its product R&D Centre and a support centre to exclusively serve our Indian clients. We plan to expand our R&D team this year and also we are planning to open offices in other cities (Mumbai, Delhi, Hyderabad and Vadodara) to stay close to our clients.
Sharing of clinical and patient data in India is a big challenge. How can this situation be improved? What steps are being taken by the government and other key stakeholders to address this issue?
Challenges faced by the industry in data sharing today by and large fall in two categories – operational and technical grounds and legal and ethical grounds. To improve technical and operational challenges of data sharing, the three most crucial things to keep in view are adherence to international data or code standards, infrastructural readiness and commitment from top management. Most of these challenges are intra-hospital or inter-hospital challenges and they can be addressed by the organisation’s internal teams. The Ministry of Health and Family Welfare has come up with EHR standards for In-
dia which is a wonderful initiative. Healthcare institutions can adapt to these standards at least to enable them to share data as and when they need. The challenges in data sharing that surround ethical and legal grounds are a bit more complex as they involve personal data protection. This is where government’s participation and involvement becomes crucial in making legislations to fully protect patient data and making sure that it is enforced properly.
How are Indian healthcare providers currently placed in terms of adopting IT-based solutions to improve efficiencies?
ANANTH THYAGARAJAN Chief Executive Officer Cittabase Solutions
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Some of our large Indian clients are up there with their international counterparts in adopting IT-based solutions to improve efficiency and patient care. However there are challenges due to their phenomenal
growth, acquisition and consolidation, etc. Small and Medium hospitals are still skeptical about analytics and Business Intelligence. New and emerging hospitals, which are highly techno-friendly, are keen to invest on IT-based solutions and taking steps in the right direction.
How healthcare ICT innovations are evolving in the Indian context?
The common concern in Indian Healthcare is the gap between the healthcare facilities available in urban and rural community due to the civil infrastructural shortfalls. Most of the ICT innovations in India at present are to close this gap using latest ICT and make those facilities accessible to the remote rural India. Mobile Real-Time Analytics has completely changed the way diagnostic and therapeutic procedures are used by clinicians.
Corporate Interview
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Newsmakers of 2016
Simplifying
CARDIAC CARE for All
What is the vision guiding Agatsa? Please share with us how the company came into existence?
Agatsa is focused on becoming a pioneer in cardiac care wherein we promise easiest and quickest method
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By developing a credit card sized portable ECG monitor which can generate sharable reports on a smartphone within seconds, Noida-based Agatsa Software Pvt Ltd has taken cardiac monitoring to a whole new level. Neha Rastogi, Co-founder of Agatsa, in an interview with Elets News Network (ENN), talks about the company’s achievements and future plans to bring in further innovations and disruptions in the Indian healthcare sector for common people. to detect, diagnose and manage cardiac problems. Unlike other health problems, time is of great importance when it comes to cardiac issues. A small delay can lead to surgery or even death. The idea to start Agatsa was conceived when we saw members of our family and dear ones being detected with heart diseases. There was no mechanism to detect a problem like a heart attack in a timely manner, except to go to a diagnostic centre for an ECG. ECG is the first test being done to detect a possible heart problem. But conventional methods of ECG are costly, time consuming and tedious. We thought of the idea of having a portable and easy to use ECG monitor which can be connected to a smartphone, quickly take ECG, share report to a doctor and get a quick diagnosis, and hence save crucial time. We started working on developing a prototype of such device and named it SANKET which means signal in Hindi.
How important is cardiac care in Indian context?
In a developing country like India, high economic growth and urbanisation have caused a large section
of population to move towards unhealthy lifestyles with decreased physical activity, increased stress levels coupled with high intake of saturated fats and tobacco. Cardiovascular Diseases (CVDs) are the largest cause of mortality, resulting in almost half of all deaths caused by Non-communicable Diseases (NCDs). CVDs are expected to be the fastest growing chronic illnesses, growing at about 9.2 per cent annually. The rate of CVDs among Indians, particularly young men, is almost twice as high as their Western counterparts. Young population is increasingly falling prey to these deadly diseases.
What is Sanket and how does it measure stress?
Sanket is a credit card sized ECG monitoring device which measures 12-lead ECGs without any leads or wires or electrodes. You just have to place your thumb on sensors or place the device with sensor touching at different positions of chest leads to measure accurate ECG in just 15 seconds on a smartphone. The report is generated and shared via mobile with a doctor for quick review. The report contains not just the ECG graph but also various heart parameters like heart rate, QTc in-
Newsmakers of 2016
tervals, R-R intervals, etc. With the heart rate and R-R intervals, we have developed our algorithms to calculate heart rate variability, which predicts up to 17 diseases and also the clinical stress levels of an individual when compared to his resting R-R interval. This is being used now in various researches to develop a correlation between mental stress and cardiac problems. Any person can purchase and use this device easily at home, record his ECG and share the report to doctor or family. Plus, we have also rolled our unique ECG interpretation services where any ECG report can be uploaded on our platform and shared and can be interpreted by our panel of experienced cardiac medical practitioners. Hence, now only in five seconds any ECG lead position can be traced out and analysed for diseases like MI, AF. This gives a tremendous advantage to general practitioners, who can take a data driven conclusive call on patient management. General practitioners are the first point of contact in most cardiac cases, but at present they either don’t have ECG machines, or they cannot interpret complex conditions using ECG. Our platform provides them both in a very cost effective manner. Using heart rate variability, we can even predict the vulnerability of an individual for 17 possible diseases. We call this Stress Analysis and this has been used very effectively in various NGOs. Several IITs are using our platform to further enhance their research work on relating mental and cardiac problems through relevant data.
Having developed devices like Sanket ECG monitor and Stress Smartapp that measures ECG and stress, which other products Agatsa Healthcare is planning in near future?
Cardiac care mainly comprises of three stages – prevention, detection and maintenance. We look forward to launch complete end-to-end solutions to provide a unique combination of pocket sized ECG monitor to quickly detect heart issues through
We successfully kicked off our pilot project under the National Health Mission programme of Tripura in association with Tata Trusts in September last year. Doctors in 45 PHCs in remote areas are successfully using our devices to quickly scan patients for cardiac problems full 12-Lead ECG on a smartphone, get timely medical interventions and assistance and services to provide personalised coaching programmes to post operative patients by bringing together cardiac healthcare providers, dieticians and physical therapists. We are gearing up to Beta launch our extended cardiac health platform called “Sanket Coach Programme.” This programme is of three months to six months duration and will provide support to heart patients (diseased or post operative) by helping them with right food choices, lifestyle modifications, physical exercise and online medical support.
How Agatsa plans to scale up?
Our Sanket devices are in the market for the past one year now and are receiving some really good feedback from heart patients, doctors, general physicians, diabetologists and general fitness providers. Even the people who just want to monitor their heart for prevention of any disease are buying Sanket. Anyone can purchase Sanket from our website or online portals like Amazon, Snapdeal and Flipkart. We successfully kicked off our pi-
lot project under the National Health Mission programme of Tripura in association with Tata Trusts in September last year. Doctors in 45 PHCs in remote areas are successfully using our devices to quickly scan patients for cardiac problems. We plan to scale up the sales of our devices and Sanket services platform in the first quarter of 2017 by reaching out to various hospitals, cardiac clinics, diagnostic centres to use and recommend our devices and Sanket Life platform to their patients for better monitoring and management of heart diseases. Agatsa intends to reach out to post operative patients who are in dire need of constant support and monitoring, patients on medication and finally to high risk patients.
What are the key challenges you face as a health device maker?
Key challenges in India include lack of standard certifications and regulations around patient-centric medical devices. Shortage of technical expertise in terms of electronics manufacturing and prototyping is another big challenge for device manufacturers in India. Finding high skilled professionals in designing and engineering areas is also tough. Support from academia to guide young students and professionals towards real innovations must be stressed upon.
How can government policies help medical device manufacturers to increase their global reach?
Regulations around patient-centric medical devices like Sanket must be brought in for better innovations, products and services in healthcare. Commercialisation grants or even debt on low interest rates to scale up and not just support for research and development would help startups like us to stand on their own, rather than depending on equity investments alone. Better infrastructure support for R&D and prototyping and manufacturing will be a huge boost to Indian medical devices industry.
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Outlook 2017
BIG PLANS ON THE
ANVIL
The year 2017 is set to herald a new growth phase in the Indian healthcare sector. Riding on the back of innovation, disruptive approach and strategic tie-ups to take on multitude of challenges, the health industry is expected to remain on the growth trajectory. Elets News Network (ENN) speaks to the industry to know about their future plans and the policy changes they expect the government to effect in order to realise their potential.
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Outlook 2017
NIPUN GOYAL, Co-founder, Curofy
Future plans for 2017
We will keep improving our core offering to the doctors and help them in all aspects of their practice including knowledge, reputation, finance and resources. We would also like to increase and improve the quality and quantity of our case repository, which can used later to develop automation tools with predictive diagnosis to help doctors take faster and accurate clinical decisions. We will first conquer the Indian market first and then go to other markets. We have already started running pilots in Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, and Nigeria etc. We plan to have 1 million doctors on the app in next 2 years. We want to lead the way in making healthcare marketing efficient by building products which can be used by various stakeholders in the industry to reach out to doctors.
Policy decisions you want to see taken in 2017
The industry does not give enough freedom to express oneself and that’s where innovative thinking takes precedence. General association of healthcare industries is with the government and the government levies a lot of rules and regulations. The policies are mostly unclear which creates a lot of confusion in the workspace. Some doctors might also find it unsafe to join in with the industry due to the similar reasons. Though the Prime Minister announced some welcoming initiatives, now it will be important to see the successful implementation of those announcements.
HUZAIFA SHEHABI, Chief Operating OfďŹ cer at Saifee Hospital
Future plans for 2017
Our future plans would be to further climb the spiral ladder on various aspects -- be it clinical or supportive services -- towards making our hospital better equipped for gravely ill patients. To make efforts to conserve power and other resources to decrease our carbon footprint. We also believe in continuously imparting training of different modules to our staff like enhancing their leadership skills, team building etc. which has helped our organisation design and implement towards bringing a positive change.
Policy decisions you want to see taken in 2017
Healthcare is a labour intensive sector where good trained labour is very much important. Some very dynamic reforms and better designed labour regulations need to be introduced by the government which will help in boosting this sector rather than being governed by the age old labour laws.
Thoughts on eHealth
e-health is an emerging field in the intersection of medical informatics, public health and business, referring to health services and information delivered or enhanced through the Internet and related technologies.
Thoughts on eHealth
World is moving towards digital technologies and so is healthcare sector. With eHealth there is significant potential to improve healthcare decision making, enhance health management, and produce better patient outcomes.
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Outlook 2017
will be product innovation around high frequency-low ticket products for small illnesses and low-frequency-high impact comprehensive products for terminal illnesses. Customized products, disease-specific products, micro-insurance products and life-stage products are also on the anvil.
Policy decisions you want to see taken in 2017
ANTONY JACOB, CEO, Apollo Munich
Future plans for 2017
With some great innovations, use of technology to enhance customer experience, growing acceptance and recent economic changes, we are expecting a huge upheaval for health insurance industry in 2017. At Apollo Munich, we will continue to adopt innovative technologies to simplify and enhance the customer experience while buying and using their health insurance policies. In terms of products, the insurance industry is on an innovation drive to address diverse and changing needs of the customers. We are working towards developing more innovative products that cater to the primary and tertiary healthcare financing needs of people. There
In terms of economic growth and development, a developing country like ours, should be able to provide basic healthcare access to its citizens. Amongst many other progressive initiatives, the launch of a universal health insurance scheme is expected to take place in 2017. Implementing the ‘Health Insurance for all’ policy will help to make quality healthcare affordable for all. Further, as health insurance is the best financial tool to mitigate ever rising healthcare costs, we hope to see a push towards lowering the service tax levied currently on health insurance, for deeper penetration and growth of this sector. We also hope that the government helps to generate additional resources in order to improve the healthcare infrastructure and thus raise the number of healthcare facilities across the country, especially in the smaller cities.
in domains like healthcare, pharmaceuticals and manufacturing. The platform shall be scaled, made capable and matured. We expect revenue streams to start from 2-3 of our deployments.
Policy decisions you want to see taken in 2017
NARENDRA NANDEKAR, Founder and CEO of WOCCOT
Broad Structure of the Organisation
Interface Infosoft solutions.P.Ltd is a software product & software services company. The company has a marketing head and a technical head. There are other functional verticals like software development, testing, HR & finance. The overall functioning of the company is looked after by the CEO.
Future plans for 2017
The platform shall be used to deploy three-four solutions
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All the healthcare organisations should come under compliance and accreditation regime. This shall ensure better and uniform out comes. Most of the digital healthcare solutions tend to be data-heavy. The cost of data transmission and reception should come down from $3.7/GB to $1/GB. This in line with Prime Minister’s digital India initiative. Also funding should be done to upgrade digital infrastructure so that the current average broad-band speed of 3.5 mbps is at least doubled in next two years.
Outlook 2017
this, our focus will be on corporate health checkups, wherein we are already getting good response from various organisations pertaining to various industry verticals. Keeping in sync with technological advancements, we attempt to offer a wide range of high-end, world class, comprehensive preventive and wellness solutions; which would be launched in the coming year. Through the new packages, we are creating a culture of prevention and are giving opportunity to help more and more families to get benefitted with regular prevention. AMOL NAIKAWADI, Joint Managing Director, Indus Health Plus
Future plans for 2017
This year, Indus will be offering multiple preventive and wellness solutions which will be focused not only on individuals but their families too. As the age for getting the lifestyle diseases is coming down rapidly, Indus has taken this cognizance and thus we are planning to come up with more advanced checkup solutions. We will be creating multiple preventive and wellness solutions which will be economical and suitable for families of all age groups. Moreover, we will also be launching finance options to cater to the needs of families and make prevention accessible and affordable to all. Like packages pertaining to different age groups, our focus will also be on offering packages for different life stages. We will also be partnering with few Insurance companies to expand the service offerings. For our existing customers, we are creating a culture of prevention by creating lot of awareness in their minds so that they opt for health checkup on an annual basis. Since, we generate Electronic Health Records (EHRs) we have their family history, by which we will be coming up with customised preventive healthcare solutions for them. Along with the above, we are continuously expanding our presence in tier II and tier III cities to create awareness about timely preventive healthcare. With
Policy decisions you want to see taken in 2017
We recommend that tax exemption should increase up to Rs. 20,000, so that more people can avail preventive health checkups and remain healthy by reducing health burden due to diabetes, cardiac and cancer diseases. The tax exemption of Rs 5,000 is a negligible amount when considered for an entire family of the assesse. Infrastructure status for the healthcare industry is a long pending demand and should be given priority by the government in the new budget. Specific tax benefits should be given to corporates only for preventive healthcare, so that they can invest in their employees’ health and wellbeing. The way healthcare services are enjoying exemptions in service tax, same should continue in the proposed GST. Since the tax rate is expected in the range of 18%, it will hugely impact the cost of healthcare of the common man.
Thoughts on eHealth
eHealth is one of the must have magazines in healthcare industry. The magazine is a credible source of healthcare, business news and information and focuses on providing medical information through digital platform, so it will go a long way. It delivers both national and regional news about the industry which is beneficial for us
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Newsmakers of 2016
Making Quality Healthcare
AFFORDABLE
Having prime focus on making the quality healthcare affordable without compromising on any parameters, Zydus Hospitals believes in clinical outcomes and patient satisfaction beyond accreditation, says Dr Sajan Nair, Group COO, Zydus Hospitals & Healthcare Research Pvt Ltd, in an interview with Elets News Network (ENN).
What are the opportunities you are looking at in terms of delivering quality healthcare in India?
Within a short span of 18 months of commissioning, Zydus Hospital is already accredited and certified for cGreen OT, NABH and NABL for the quality process and protocols implemented. It was a very proud moment for us when we recently got accredited with NABH certification for emergency medicine services -- the first hospital in Gujarat and fourth in the country to have achieved this feat. Regarding the accreditation, we are moving ahead for CAP in laboratory services, NABH for radiology, blood bank and nursing excellence. By December 2017 we hope to be JCI accredited. As for the quality of services delivered, our vision is clinical outcomes and patient satisfaction beyond accreditation. We are committed to delivering standard clinical and nursing services /process including care plan pathways with strong focus on regular internal/ external quality programmes. However our prime mission is to make the quality healthcare affordable without compromising on any parameters.
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Newsmakers of 2016
Our staunch belief of having transparency in billing services and the various walk in/walk out packages has resulted in huge patient satisfaction as also the non-differential policy regarding the same. Further, a system of checks and balances has been put in place for each of the non-medical services provided including housekeeping, food, etc. This keeps the patient and his attendant happy and satisfied
Please share with us your shortterm and long-term expansion plans? What do you propose to achieve in 2017?
Zydus Hospital is coming up with fullfledged radiation centre and oncology unit with the latest technology and full-time consultants in collaboration with a very reputed oncology institute of US/Europe. The treatment protocols will be as per the standards recommended and practiced. Presently we have a 550 bedded hospital in Ahmedabad & a 180 bedded hospital in Anand. Our Plan is to have a presence in all the five major cities of Gujarat with small outreach clinics across the state.
What are the key health services you offer and how do you plan to expand them?
We are focusing on high-end tertiary care especially in areas of neuro, cardiac, renal, gastro, orthopedics and critical care. Regarding expansion, we have plans to tie up with like-minded hospitals in tier two and three cities across the state and in Africa. We hope to help them in getting good clinical outcomes by our team of experts through network connectivity using teleradiology and telemedicine. In addition to that the presence of outreach clinics will play a major role in meeting the unmet needs
How are you leveraging ICT to improve efficiency of the hospital? Which key initiatives have you initiated in this regard?
We have been extensively using ICT for data capturing and analysis
KEY ACCOMPLISHMENTS SO FAR 1. cGreen OT, NABH and NABL accreditions in 18 months of operations 2. Transparency in billing services and the various walk in/walk out packages 3. Coming up with full-fledged radiation centre and oncology unit with latest technology in partnership with reputed oncology institute of US/Europe 4. Plans to set up seven hospitals -- five in major cities of Gujarat, one each in Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan 5. Plans to tie up with like-minded hospitals in tier-II and III cities across India and in Africa 6. Zydus has executed 214 community-based educational programmes as part of its CSR initiative 7. Robust medical tourism programme for foreigners and NRIs who want quality treatment at the right cost
We have plans to tie up with like-minded hospitals in tier two and three cities across the state and in Africa. We hope to help them in getting good clinical outcomes by our team of experts through network connectivity using teleradiology and telemedicine. across all segments including medical and nursing. Our mobile application makes it easy for people to reach out and we would soon be integrating the details to be made available for the patient on one click across the net. Going forward within three to four years, we are looking to be at Stage 7 of the Asia pacific EMRAM score as per the reference of HIMMS Analytics.
Please tell us about the CSR initiatives you have undertaken recently.
Zydus Hospital is working with the communities for promotion of good health through educational programmes – both inside and outside the hospital. As of now, we have done almost 214 community based educational programmes. Specific programmes are done regularly keeping in mind the target audience like pollution and its effects with the traffic police where each and
every policemen was given a health checkup and safety masks for prevention. Programmes with chief ministers’ office for healthy living of girl students studying in municipal schools are just some of the few initiatives undertaken.
How is Zydus Hospitals promoting health tourism in India?
We are looking at Africa as a country and also the segment of non- resident Indians across the globe especially the NRGs who are looking at quality treatment at the right cost. We work on a system of complete end-to-end package. No surprises for the patient travelling into a foreign country for treatment. Once they are in the city it’s the responsibility of the hospital to take care of receiving to departure of the patient and his attendants. It’s important that they go back with happy memories of the city and more important the country which is foremost. JANUARY / 2017 ehealth.eletsonline.com
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Newsmakers of 2016
FLAG BEARERS of Excellence in Healthcare
With passion for making people better, Columbia Asia Hospital has been redefining quality healthcare in India based on strong foundation of benchmarked protocols and practice, state-of-the-art technology and infrastructure supported by well trained staff and high ethical standards. Dr Nandakumar Jairam, GMD & Chairman, Columbia Asia Hospitals, in an interview with Elets News Network (ENN), gives valuable insights into the values that separate the group from other healthcare providers.
What drives Columbia Asia Hospital’s vision and growth in India?
Our organisational focus on patient care, people development and innovation makes us one of the flag bearers of clinical and service excellence in healthcare. At Columbia Asia Hospitals, patients are the centre of everyone’s attention and care. Looking after their condition, convenience and comfort is the highest priority. The look and feel of Columbia Asia Hospitals is characteristic and unique in architecture and design. The expertise and competence of our consultants, paramedics and staff forms the essence of the brand. Some of the key differentiators include flat pricing for procedures and digitised patients records. The brand is today synonymous with: ● High quality clinical care and outcomes ● Benchmarked protocols and practice
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● State-of-the-art technology & infrastructure ● High standards of infection control & hygiene ● Personalised service provided by well trained staff ● Ethical standards ● Excellent value Our vision: To have a passion for making people better. Our values include: CUSTOMER FIRST - Anticipating customer needs and exceeding their expectations EXCELLENCE - Delivering the highest standard of patient care. TEAMWORK - Working together with mutual respect towards a common goal. INTEGRITY - Honesty and a commitment to always doing the right thing. CARING - Nurturing a culture of caring for our patients, their families, and each other.
COMMUNITY - Sharing and being involved in the life of the communities we serve.
How is Columbia Asia different from other super-specialty hospitals that have come up across the country in recent years?
At Columbia Asia, comprehensive medical programmes demand ethics, excellence and strict clinical governance. All of our operations follow international quality assurance guidelines that meet the highest standard of patient care. These, combined with a transparent pricing structure, are the fundamental pillars in the practice of evidence based healthcare at Columbia Asia. The clinical programme at our hospitals has evolved over the years based on the changing need of the community. We have added super specializations like Liver Transplantation, Bone Marrow Transplantation,
Newsmakers of 2016
Deep Brain Stimulation, High-end Urology, High-end Neurosurgical procedures, Interventional Cardiology, Cardiac surgery, Bariatric Surgery, IVF, and others. We have established centres of excellence (CoE) around specialties like kidney transplant, gastric and liver diseases and orthopedics, to name a few. The core elements that go into a CoE include engaging the patient by educating him or her better about the disease condition, an integrated care approach and driving excellence in patient care while objectively measuring the quality of our efforts and outcomes. We have standardised clinical terminologies through the adoption of SNOMED CT for all the procedures and also the adoption of ICD 10 for diagnoses. Using standard terminologies allows us to practice evidence based medicine by comparing the treatment given to patients for the same diagnoses or procedure and ensuring that the treatment is standardised and audited by collating and comparing records for patients with similar diagnoses. All the employees are extensively trained in our 3C brand standards. These are experiential standards which enhance the customer journey through each of the touch points. All the employees are encouraged to live upto the 3C standards. Each customer is different and understanding them is an art. Customer profiling together with anticipating their eminent and hidden needs to exceed expectations are our tools in doing so. The employees are trained to be competent, warm, friendly and passionate about what they do and have the spirit to serve. When you meet a Columbia Asian, you’ll be greeted with a smile and a warm sense of pride. Columbia Asia continuously encourages innovation. ● Multidisciplinary team meetings to understand a medical situation to evaluate and finalize the optimal way in which the patient can be handled. ● Using technology as an enabler to drive better patient experience and outcomes e.g. tele radiology and telemedicine, consultant and
Columbia Asia has been successfully running a 10-bed hospital that has recently been scaled up to 30 patient beds, for the last five years in Doddaballapur, a rural area adjoining Bangalore patient applications, self-help kiosks, etc. ● Continuous exposure to managers to adopt best practices in the industry through well planned training programs (in-house and external) ● Encouraging innovation by having informal sessions with employees and recognizing and pushing them to innovate. ● Learning from other industries – The Company encourages industry experts from non-healthcare settings to engage and share their experiences as well as practices. The company also hires from other industries. This allows them to gain valuable inputs for improving existing processes.
Please brief us about the healthcare services being offered by Columbia Asia.
Columbia Asia hospitals aim to be the preferred choice of healthcare services for families and businesses. With around 100 beds per medical facility for the multi-specialty hospitals and around 200 beds in the referral hospitals, the buildings showcase smooth patient flow and new medical technologies to decrease the levels of invasive treatments; the efficiency of patient care is optimized resulting in a shorter length of stay and hence reduced costs and better affordability for patients. As progressive as medical technology may be, the differentiation in healthcare relies much on the people delivering the care – highly skilled medical consultants, caring
nurses as well as teams of committed staff who see to every patient’s needs. The multi-specialty hospitals of Columbia Asia provide a wide array of medical services such as general surgery, interventional cardiology, pediatrics, obstetrics and gynecology, orthopedics and internal medicine. The referral hospital provides comprehensive tertiary care and high end services in multiple specialties like interventional and surgical cardiology, liver transplant, bone marrow transplant, etc. These are supported by a comprehensive list of ancillary services that include an intensive care unit, neonatal care unit, physiotherapy, laboratory, pharmacy and imaging.
With rural-urban gap in tertiary care a major concern in India why most tertiary care hospitals are located in urban areas? What are the key challenges for private hospitals to set up base in rural areas of the country?
Lack of trained manpower and availability of the desired infrastructure and ability to pay for services are the major challenges that come in the way of setting up tertiary care hospitals in rural areas. However, Columbia Asia has been successfully running a 10 bed hospital that has recently been scaled up to 30 patient beds, for the last five years in Doddaballapur, a rural area adjoining Bangalore. Similarly, we have been successfully running 100-bed hospitals in Tier-II towns like Patiala, Mysore and Ghaziabad. All these hospitals now offer high end-services like interventional cardiology, renal transplants, joint replacements, and so on. In fact our Patiala hospital runs the only transplant centre in entire Malwa region of Punjab.
Please share with us your future expansion plans.
We plan to commission our upcoming 206-bed hospital in Sarjapur, Bangalore during the fourth quarter of the 2017. This will be our fifth hospital in the Bangalore cluster. We plan to expand in the Pune area as well shortly.
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Sahara Hospital: ENSURING QUALITY & AFFORDABLE CARE
Established with a clear vision of making quality care affordable for common man, Sahara Hospital in Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh is a shining example of how hospitals can bridge the gap between quality health care and affordability, jointly say Anil Vikram Singh, Senior Advisor, Sahara India Pariwar (Sahara Hospital) and Dr Mazhar Husain, Director, Medical Health(Chief Neurosurgen), Sahara Hospital, in an interview with Arpit Gupta of Elets News Network (ENN). standards of patient care. We always ensure that the treatment is correct and affordable for the patient.
our specialist tool and adding more facilities to the hospital like radiation oncology, etc.
Common man has this perception that private hospitals tend to overcharge them. How Sahara is trying to break this myth?
ANIL VIKRAM SINGH Senior Advisor, Sahara India Pariwar (Sahara Hospital)
What is the vision behind Sahara Hospital?
It is the vision of our Managing Worker and Chairman Saharasri Subrata Roy. He realised that good hospitals should be provided to the common man where they can receive proper treatment. People used to go to Delhi and Mumbai for treatment. He was clear in his vision that he didn’t want to make it a profit making business. In fact, he wanted to give something back to the society. It was decided that WHATEVER profit is made it would be used to expand the hospital and its facilities. We have set new
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We organise camps and set up OPDs in nearby cities. Patients from cities like Kanpur and Allahabad frequently come to our hospital. We keep sending our doctors to other cities. In collaboration with schools and colleges, we try to raise awareness about the basic healthcare facilities. There is no hidden cost for patients at Sahara. Patient care charges are transparent and itemised. Our chairman’s vision and our efforts are to reach poor people, create awareness and provide them better healthcare services.
Do you think we need to pay more attention to emergency care and services?
Definitely, we provide round-the-clock emergency services to our patients. Doctors are available all the time. If any other specialist is required, they are made available as a when needed on an urgent basis.
What is your hospital’s roadmap to improve its services?
We are in the process of enriching
DR. MAZHAR HUSAIN Director, Medical Health (chief neurosurgeon) Sahara Hospital
How is Sahara Hospital transforming healthcare in India?
Sahara Hospital is transforming healthcare in India in many ways. It is trying to bridge the gap between quality health care and affordability. The Sahara Hospital is a NABH-accredited hospital and the department of Lab Medicine is NABL accredited. With dedicated, expert and experi-
enced doctors around, one is assured of quality, compassionate care and the most important – healing touch.
Please tell us about the services being offered by Sahara Hospital.
The hospital provides high quality and cost effective services, coupled with the warmth and caring attitude. Sahara Hospital is the only corporate tertiary care set up in Eastern UP. As a multispecialty, tertiary care destination, the hospital offers integrated quality healthcare with the availability of all super specialties and latest generation diagnostic facilities under one roof. It is complimenting the public sector and the charity hospitals in this region. It is the only private set up in the region that performs Kidney Transplant and Bone Marrow Transplant. Sahara Hospital provides its services in the rural areas also through various health care camp activities and mobile dispensaries which cater to rural areas in Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Nepal. Sahara Hospital is currently operating with 53 specialties, 8 support departments, and a 147-beded critical care unit. The hospital has all the diagnostic services available round
the clock. This includes Radiology, Lab Medicine, Endoscopy, and special diagnostic services,-all located under one roof. This also includes 4D Ultrasound, latest generation Cardiac CT, MRI, a Cardiac Cath Lab.
What were your key achievements in 2016?
The key achievements of the year 2016 are: ● Received award for the Best Multispecialty hospital in the non metro category from ICICI Lombard and CNBC Awaaz 18 ● Successfully completed the Surveillance Assessment by NABH ● Successfully completed the Re assessment of Dept. of Lab Medicine
Sahara Hospital is currently operating with 53 specialties, eight support departments, and a 147-beded critical care unit. The hospital has all the diagnostic services available round the clock
● Received a certificate of merit by ABP News for Healthcare Destination We have been nominated as the best multispecialty hospital for the following awards: ● National quality excellence award 2017 for best multispecialty hospital in Uttar Pradesh ● Rose of Paracelsus award constituted by the Arab Medical, Health Association ● India Risk Management Award, Season 3 constituted by ICICI Lombard and CNC TV 18 ● DL Shah Quality Award for the coming year ● World Health and Wellness Congress and Awards 2017
What are your plans for the next year?
Sahara Hospital’s key plans for the year 2017 include: ● Commence Radiation Oncology ● To Develop IVF Centre ● Expand Medical Tourism ● Open a Liver Transplant Unit
Which key challenges you see are creating roadblocks for improving healthcare delivery system in India?
The healthcare situation in India
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when we look across the country in a cross-section is of course grim. There are many challenges that are creating roadblocks for improving healthcare delivery system in India. In rural India, there is a lack of quality infrastructure, dearth of qualified medical functionaries, and access to basic medicines and medical facilities is difficult. There is lack of education, knowledge and awareness at the grass roots. The family head is responsible for all the healthcare related decisions. People are habituated to domestic cures for their ailments and are very apprehensive about using medicines. They only visit a doctor as the last resort after having tried everything they have been advised by relatives and neighbours. There is lack of effective implementation of government initiatives at the grassroots level.
How is Sahara Hospital making tertiary healthcare more inclusive? Please tell us about the key initiatives the hospital has taken to deliver quality healthcare to the poor.
Traditionally, the government is the major provider of healthcare services for the poor, especially in rural and semi-urban areas. Charitable trusts and NGOs have played a complementary role. Sahara Hospital is one such hospital that is located in tier II city to
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Sahara Hospital is one such hospital that is located in tier II city to address the challenge of health inequities, improving healthcare access and balancing quality care with affordability. It is catering to the population that is based in whole of UP, neighbouring areas of Bihar and Nepal address the challenge of health inequities, improving healthcare access and balancing quality care with affordability. It is catering to the population that is based in whole of UP, neighboring areas of Bihar, Nepal etc. It is providing inclusiveness through proximity and providing quality healthcare at an affordable cost. It is a medical destination for people of Purvanchal. Sahara Hospital conducts rural outreach programs that include camps and village door to door activities. The camps organised by Sahara
Hospital on various diseases provide awareness and education on the diseases and its control. Also, such camps provide free of cost investigations that strongly conveys the message of preventive healthcare.
How the hospital is leveraging new technologies to improve operational efďŹ ciency and quality of its services?
Sahara Hospital is committed to leverage on best of technology and technical knowhow and innovation to offer every patient best in class service. We have best in class medical equipments that incorporate latest technology. The hospital adopts state of the art technology in all the medical equipments. Hospital has introduced Hospital Information System (HIS) for managing hospital operations in the most efficient and effective way. We are gearing up with providing SMS service for appointments and Lab Medicine reports even on email. There already exists a Pneumatic tube system in the department of Lab medicine. A hospital laboratory is often a place of intense activity: countless samples arrive here daily and are analyzed, evaluated, and the results passed on, and all of that under enormous time pressure. By using pneumatic tube systems samples taken are sent for analysis immediately, without running time-consuming errands. Our hospital is also gearing up for an e-prescription service to replace the legendary doctor scrawl on hand written prescriptions. Patient histories, diagnostic reports, discharge summaries and other vital information regarding an existing patient will all be digitally stored so they can be accessed remotely by the patient as well as by any of the Consultant of our hospital (with informed patient consent). Once this all comes together, it will be a useful tool in emergency situations where speed is of the essence. Sahara Hospital takes pride in sharing one of the patients observation “Best can not be, Bettered more.�
4
POWER
PACKED MAGAZINES
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Newsmakers of 2016
Taking Healthcare to the
NEXT LEVEL
Medics Super Speciality Hospital has made it its mission to raise the quality of healthcare in Uttar Pradesh to a whole new level, riding on the back of two and a half decades of experience in delivering genuine and reliable healthcare services. Dr Mayank Somani, CEO, Medics Super Speciality Hospital, in an interview with Elets News Network (ENN), speaks about the vision, differentiating factors and the hospital’s unique approach to provide a patient friendly environment in the upcoming 300bed super speciality tertiary care hospital in Lucknow.
What will differentiate Medics Super Speciality Hospital from other healthcare providers in Lucknow?
Medics Super Speciality Hospital is a state-of the- art 300-bed super speciality tertiary care hospital, the first in the city and the whole of central and eastern UP. The combination of latest infrastructure and cutting-edge technology adds value to the elite doctors and management team of medics. Readily available medical services in all specialties and super specialties under one roof is a remarkable differentiator in the whole of North India.
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Newsmakers of 2016
Please brief us about the medical facilities at the hospital.
Medics is here to bring in super Speciality services. Our centres of excellences are: - Oncology (Medical, Surgical & Radiation) , Gastrosciences, Neurosciences, Cardiac Sciences, Orthopaedics, Renal sciences & Critical care. Besides these centres of excellence, the hospital will provide all possible clinical care under one roof. To support such medical programmes high end equipments viz. 2 LINAC, 2 Cath Labs, MRI , CT , Sophisticated pathology lab, PET CT, & Gamma Camera. Our high end Critical Care zone has a capacity of 110 beds, 14 beds NICU at 3 levels of care. Our infrastructure has 17 Emergency beds, 18 Dialysis beds, Endoscopy & Lithotripsy Suites, VIP Suites & Deluxe Rooms.
The hospital is the first LEED certified building attaining Gold Certificate in north India. What does that mean?
Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED), is a certification programme that denotes how “green�, or compliant in terms of energy conservation, water usage, air quality, and building materials; a building is over the course of its construction and thereafter. LEED certification comes in four levels. LEED - Certified buildings, silver buildings, gold buildings, and platinum buildings. Green building is a holistic concept that starts with the understanding that the built environment can have profound effects, both positive and negative, on the natural environment, as well as the people who inhabit those building. Green building is an effort to amplify the positive and mitigate the negative of these effects throughout the entire life cycle of a building. LEED-certified buildings are resource efficient. They use less water and energy and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. As a bonus, they save money. The design has been done by Mr. Manu Malhotra, RSMS.
Uttar Pradesh has a huge population of poor people who cannot afford quality healthcare.
How will Medics Super Specialty address this challenge? Is there any plan in place for treating poor people from the state?
Yes, there is a clear cut policy decision at the level of board that none of our patients will get compromised treatment, owing to their socioeconomic status. We have tied up with doctors, pharmaceutical companies and bigger NGOs to ensure the same. Many innovative moves are also planned in the form of economic wards and cross subsidy models.
There is a clear cut policy decision at the level of board that none of the sick patients will get compromised treatment, just because of their lower socioeconomic status
Being Uttar Pradesh’s biggest hospital, Medics Super Speciality will also have big challenges in terms of managing workflow. How do you see emerging technologies helping you to manage such challenges?
Management as per the word is self-explanatory. What Medics intends to do is seamless management. The only way that can be achieved is by having the right team. Medics has invested immensely in bringing all healthcare personnel together as a team. The different teams are not micromanaged but have been empowered to become efficient leaders of the future. The hospital follows a horizontal organizational hierarchy system which gives space for capable individuals to be the decision makers where it matters the most. Moreover, Medics has very strong IT infrastructure and software, the best in the healthcare space, to make the process and work flow seamlessly. Medics is also a completely Wi-Fi enabled building which ensures efficient and smooth work flow transitions.
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Corporate Interview
INTEGRATING HEALTHCARE Solutions to gain EďŹƒciency
The future belongs to connected healthcare services, says Ramakanth Desai, CEO, Curespring, a technology company dedicated to provide affordable and specialised healthcare for patients by integrating work across physicians, diagnostic labs and specialist doctors, in an interview with Elets News Network (ENN). How is Curespring impacting consulting services in the Indian healthcare sector? How is it contributing in improving quality of services? Indian healthcare sector is highly fragmented today and very unorganised. There is no well defined mechanism for collaborative patient care, doctor-to-doctor connectivity, diagnostics chain integration and sharing of patient information. With our solutions (doctor-to-doctor collaboration platform, HIS with
Artificial Intelligence, with its ability to process data in a speedy fashion, will revolutionise healthcare in the future. AI-enabled system as a backup helps reduce medical errors and increases productivity of medical professionals. 54
JANUARY / 2017 ehealth.eletsonline.com
Corporate Interview
measures, lab information system, PACS integrated with the above platforms), we are well placed to help hospitals and diagnostic labs in developing and managing some of these measures. We are also exploring to do joint studies with some US-based healthcare consulting firms to bring best practices from the global arena to India. For example, there are no defined ways for measuring physician productivity, revenue cycle management to management of supply chain, both for care and diagnostics.
Please tell us about digital transformation happening in the healthcare space in India? What does the future look like in five years from now? The future belongs to connected healthcare services. IT use for care and cure is currently limited to offline information obtained from diagnostics. There is no integration of information across channels (like diagnostics/patient records and stakeholders collaboration). It is very important that the three get integrated for effective and responsive care. We at Curespring focus on addressing this problem, leveraging our connected healthcare solutions. Currently, digital transformation has started in urban areas around few business processes like doctor appointments, billing, patient registration, diagnostic image management, etc. Approximately 40 per cent of hospitals have automated the admin processes like billing or registration.
How is digital adoption associated with improving medical providers’ profitability? It is very crucial to measure few critical parameters like optimum utilisation of physician’s time, training of nurses, supply chain management to spend performance management. Smaller hospitals are suffering much more than larger hospitals in these
Currently, digital transformation has started in urban areas around few business processes like doctor appointments, billing, patient registration, diagnostic image management, etc. areas. Adoption of digital technologies helps improve availability of patients’ diagnostics information in a timely way and thereby reducing patient wait times leading to better patient satisfaction. For example, in lot of hospitals, patient discharge to bed availability time, physician’s utilisation, enhanced patient inflow through remote consult are not measured. It takes some times 5-6 hours for the patient discharge process to be completed. Adoption of digital technologies and integration of systems will go a long way in improving some of these areas, and thereby increasing profitability.
How online platforms like Curespring are utilising analytics to improve overall efficiency of healthcare delivery? Curespring today provides three critical IT platforms for a provider to enhance doctor-to-doctor collaboration and enable remote care. Using our connected healthcare services platform, hospitals have started witnessing enhanced patient inflow due to better care for remote patients and improved collaboration inside the hospital.
How is Artificial Intelligence (AI) being deployed in healthcare sector? What is its future potential? We are investing in automation plat-
form around AI to address some of the critical areas. Artificial Intelligence, with its ability to process data in a speedy fashion, will revolutionise healthcare in the future. An AI-enabled system as a backup helps reduce medical errors and increases productivity of medical professionals. For example, diabetic retinopathy exists in at least 20 million people in India. AI technology can help doctors collect images of retina of diabetic patients and then run them through machines which can quickly scan the images and arrive at an early diagnosis. Using AI, one can do predictive modelling of diseases to prevent disease outbreak (population health management areas) and also do preliminary diagnosis and screening. The right AI system might predict the outcomes of overusing antibiotics for patients, even before the doses are administered. Using our cloud-based HIS, hospitals have achieved patient discharge times less than 30 minutes. Using our connected PACS solution, hospitals and diagnostic labs have integrated both patient records and diagnostics from multiple modalities (both DICOM and Non-DICOM).
Post demonetisation, digital payments in healthcare sector has seen a quantum jump. What are the opportunities and challenges you see linked with digital payments in healthcare? How Curespring has responded to the change? Using platforms like Paytm, patients can pay consultation charges and diagnostics easily. This will reduce the waiting time at billing counters and also provides for adoption of deployment of public health schemes faster. We do not have solution in payments space, but we have integrated our platforms with online payment platforms.
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Public Health
Assessing Climate Change Impact on
PUBLIC HEALTH
There is an urgent need to accept that climate change is a reality and no single department or a system can manage adaptation, resilience, mitigation in isolation, says Dr Vikas Desai, Technical Director, Urban Health and Climate Resilience Centre (UHCRC), Surat, in an interview with Manish Arora of Elets News Network (ENN). What kind of work UHCRC is doing in the public health space. What are the organisation’s goals?
The Urban Health and Climate Resilience Centre (UHCRC) is one of the first such centres in India initiated under the Surat Climate Change Trust Governance. This initiative is supported by Asian City Climate Change Resilience Network (ACCCRN) of Rockefeller Foundation and executed by the Health Department of Surat Municipal Corporation. TARU International is the project holder and knowledge partner. UHCRC strives to be a knowledge hub in the area of urban health and climate resilience, addressing public health and urban climate change adaptation and resilience issues in India. This centre has been established in the western city of Surat known for its public health sensitivity. Launched in April 2013, the UHCRC gets funding support from Rockefeller Foundation. After completing its tenure in December 2016, it is in transit phase of sustainability mode as a ‘Urban Health and Climate Resilience Centre of Excellence (UHCRCE)’ to continue its techno academic contribution in the field of urban health, with a climate resilience focus not only for the city of Surat but also for urban Gujarat and India. UHCRC aims at studying, piloting and assisting programmes for city
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authorities to upscale and prepare urban health services to adapt to climate change challenges. UHCRC strategy includes research, training, documentation, networking and consultancy. There is no restriction to area of work of UHCRC, but it first started its work from Surat city followed by Gujarat state and then in cities of the other states.
How has the deteriorating environment impacted public health in Indian cities?
Health is an outcome of complex interaction between human beings and environment.
Here environment refers to internal environment like genes, nutrition, immunity, age, sex, lifestyle, etc, and external environment like physical, social, economical, political, service system, etc. Complex interactions between all external and internal factors decide health of an individual, family, society or a city, district or nation. All external factors are interrelated and climate change is a cause as well as an effect of changing environment, and its impact on health. Entire epidemiological triad is influenced by climate change.
What kind of evidence has
All external factors are interrelated and climate change is a cause as well as an effect of changing environment, and its impact on health
Public Health
UHCRC come across to assess this impact?
To understand effect of climate change on public health there is a need of city specific health and climate data. UHCRC challenge is to understand local climate trend, local health statistics and analysis their inter relations. To understand public health profile of any city, there is a need to understand its geography, health services, infrastructure, socio demography and health seeking behaviour of the community. UHCRC worked on retrospective health data of Surat city and city specific climate. It studied public and private health service network, population characteristics, health seeking behaviour and community behaviour and participation. Following these basic studies of Surat city, UHCRC assessed impact of heat on public health, floods on public health, spatial integrated public health vulnerability in the city and community practices and models. UHCRC also studied public health vulnerability of seven mega cities of Gujarat following the Surat city experience.
With climate change clearly emerging as key challenge in near future, how are Indian cities placed to mitigate its adverse effects on public health?
Climate change is a global phenomena but its impact is local focal. So, city specific planning needs local temporal, spatial information based on which local evidence based information can be planned. One of the major challenges for health and climate resilience study is availability of standard data. In India climate data for every city is not available. Health data is scarce and not standardised. Technology enabled system does not guarantee adequate coverage and quality data resulting in to limitations. Though health is one of the impact of climate change, it’s more sensitive and emotional indicator for advocacy. Health focused climate resilience in urban setup is the need of the hour as health is not only an individual
challenge but a societal challenge as well. Impact on health is not only disease, disability or death it is also loss of productivity and impact on economy and development. Individual resilience to climate change is dependent on health status and ability to adapt to climate changes. What is needed is health focused approach to climate resilience, health
Health focused climate resilience in urban setup is the need of the hour, as health is not only an individual challenge but a societal challenge as well
in every urban planning and a process of strong inter-sectoral convergence to plan, implement and monitor together. The urgent need to accept that climate change is a reality and no single department or a system can manage adaptation, resilience and mitigation in isolation. Health and climate resilience planning and implementation need to be part of every process. It cannot wait till some interventions are over. It has to happen now.
How is UHCRC leveraging technologies to achieve its targets?
UHCRC explorative studies use technology for public health and climate convergence, prepare action plans like IT supported disease surveillance system, M-health solutions, community participation and education applications.
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Newsmakers of 2016
Architects of Quality
PUBLIC HEALTHCARE
Sanjay Gandhi Post Graduate Institute of Medical Sciences (SGPGIMS), Lucknow, is a premiere tertiary care institution delivering affordable quality healthcare to millions of people in Uttar Pradesh and north India. With plans afoot to further transform the institute into a world-class facility, Prof. Rakesh Kapoor, Director, SGPGIMS, and Associate Professor Dr Rajesh Harsvardhan from SGPGIMS Hospital Administration speak to Arpit Gupta of Elets News Network about how the institute’s existing facilities are set to receive a major boost. Excerpts:
Prof. Rakesh Kapoor What do you plan to achieve in 2017 in terms of improving healthcare facilities?
Sanjay Gandhi Post Graduate Institute of Medical Sciences (SGPGIMS)-Lucknow is a tertiary care institution. It’s a full-fledged super specialty hospital. In 2017, we aim to further strengthen the existing facilities by procuring more equipment, expanding treat-
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ment facilities and increasing number of beds. Since we are a referral centre, we get a lot of patients in need of emergency tertiary care services which requires world-class facilities. I have set a target to implement four major projects – an emergency medicine department, a renal transplant centre, a liver transplant facility and robotic surgery. My first plan is to form an emergency medicine department to be a 280-bed department to treat critical patients. For example, if a heart attack patient is referred to us, we would be having a cardiac suite where immediately we can treat the patient. The department will be equipped with all facilities to treat patients having a stroke, or gastro problem like bleeding, or patient with dengue or swine flu. The second plan is to have a renal transplant centre. At the moment, in north India, barring Delhi, we are the only centre doing renal transplant. Despite receiving 1,000 referral cases per year, we are able to do only about 130 transplants a year. Causing a waiting period is six to eight months at times. The renal transplant centre would be equipped with dialysis facility. It will enable us to treat more patients with chronic renal failure.
My third plan is to develop a world-class facility for liver transplant. Initially, we started doing liver transplants but could not carry it for long. With building and infrastructure ready and I am going to invest in the equipment for liver transplant. We hope to succeed in our endeavour. The fourth plan is to start performing robotic surgery to keep pace with innovations happening in this field. Once we have the equipment in place, we will go ahead with this plan.
What is your plan to expand the services to benefit more people? Also, what’s your take on medical tourism?
We will soon shift to a new OPD complex. We are planning to have a 180bed daycare ward in the old OPD complex. This will help us increase patient intake and treat more people. We get a lot of patients from Bangladesh, Nepal, Middle East and other neighbouring countries. But we are unable to promote medical tourism due to long waiting list of patients. If a patient comes to us for medical tourism, he would expect immediately admission and treatment which is not possible given our limitations.
Please tell us about key R&D
Newsmakers of 2016
initiatives the hospital has undertaken?
We have to focus a lot of our attention on patient care but research is also one of our primary mottos. We are doing more research on issues related to patient care. For example, ours is one of the primary centres in the country for Hepatitis E. We have come up with a lot of good papers on Hepatitis E and we are providing valuable inputs to other hospitals too.
Please tell us about your plans on collaborating with the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT).
We are coming up with an ambitious project in collaboration with the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT). We are trying to develop some new instruments and gadgets to give a boost to Prime Minister’s ‘Make in India’ initiative, which will make healthcare affordable and within the reach of all. Prime Minister Narendra Modi is quite clear that we should adopt local innovations. We are dependent on Western countries and multinational companies for supplies of healthcare devices. Through this initiative, we can come up with our own cheaper versions.
the medical landscape of the country. It is only second exclusive post graduate institute (no UG programmes) rendering healthcare to the populace of the country and even beyond, covering almost all medical super specialties supported by cutting edge technology. SGPGIMS being at the apex of healthcare pyramid in Uttar Pradesh has been improving healthcare delivery by adopting three pronged strategy – research, capacity building and direct patient care. Through research, the institute augments and advances treatment modalities or designs new patterns of care. SGPGIMS builds capacity by virtue of its well knit post-doctoroal and post-graduate programmes under the stewardship of Dean Prof. Rajan Saxena. The institute renders direct patient care to millions of people with the help of its wide network of OPD/IPD/ERS/day care/advance labs.
What are the key healthcare services being offered at SGPGIMS? Can they be expanded?
Dr Rajesh Harsvardhan As a premier tertiary hospital in Uttar Pradesh how is SGPGIMS contributing to improve healthcare delivery system in the state?
SGPGIMS, an autonomous super specialty institute of international repute, has left an indelible imprint on
SGPGIMS is offering super specialty services through its over 30 super specialty academic departments manned by & faculty of international repute who are leaders in their respective fields and an array of diagnostic, interventional and therapeutic arms. A new OPD block is on the verge of commissioning and soon there will be a separate emergency block, which will augment efficiency and expand the range of services.
Being a state-run institution, how the hospital ensures quality of its services are maintained at
par with private providers?
SGPGIMS is committed to quality. Since its inception, the institute has been foraying into several newer vistas. It has many firsts to its credit and it carved many new departments which were not available anywhere else in the country. It never believed in rampant growth. SGPGIMS, for the first time in public sector healthcare, introduced HIS which highlights its commitment to quality. The institute conducts many healthcare audits. Recently, the Department of Hospital Administration conducted a study along different parameters of patient safety. Further, SGPGIMS administration has recently approved, in principle, the proposal to establish a patient safety cell under Medical Superintendent Prof. Amit Agarwal.
Which ICT initiatives SGPGIMS has undertaken to improve operational efficiency and increase its mass reach?
SGPGIMS has established country’s first National Nodal Tele-medicine Centre, which has been contributing to the cause of mass outreach. Further, SGPGIMS has a department of Health Informatics taking care of ICT activities. The entire interface between patient and healthcare delivery is online. It includes patient registration, discharge, investigations and payments. SGPGIMS has introduced the pneumatic tube system for transport of samples from point of collection to various laboratories for analysis, which is another first among government healthcare organisations in the country. The Examination Cell also has an operational online system.
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Industry View
Pioneering Quality Healthcare in
NIGERIA
Please tell us about key products and services offered by Dana Pharmaceuticals and Dana Drugs Ltd.
Dana is a Nigeria-based conglomerate with diversified businesses like airlines, steel, automobile, plastic, mineral water and pharmaceuticals. Dana’s pharmaceuticals business has offices in Nigeria and India. We have two factories in Nigeria. One is in Ibadan of IV fluids and the other state-of-the-art plant is in Minna that makes IV fluids, tablets, capsules, etc. Dana Drugs Ltd is importer of formulations, surgicals and functions as the distribution arm for imports and locally manufactured pharmaceutical products with huge warehousing facilities all over Nigeria in strategic locations, catering to whole Nigeria with 400 plus distributors. We are among the top leaders in the field of IV fluids. Some leading brands in the Nigerian market like Paradana (Paracetamol), Danacid (Antacid), Ferrodan (iron supplement) are manufactured and marketed in Nigeria by Dana.
What are the differences and similarities between the Indian and Nigerian markets?
The Indian market is more general practitioner-oriented, whereas the Nigerian market is clinic and polyclinic-oriented at grass root level. Then you have hospitals, primary healthcare, teaching hospitals, which are similar to India. The Indian market manufactures latest molecules, while in the Nigerian market molecules used in the 90’s
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With an aim to provide better healthcare to Nigerians, Dana Pharmaceuticals Pvt Ltd, an Indian business arm of the Nigeria-based Dana Group seeks partnerships with Indian healthcare providers for technology transfers in areas of healthcare, says Anil Gidwani, Director-Pharma Business, Dana Pharmaceuticals Pvt Ltd, Mumbai, in an interview with Elets News Network (ENN). are more popular and new molecules are being imported. The Indian manufacturing has matured, whereas Nigeria is trying to improve upon standards every day. The other difference is that the Indian healthcare sector is dominated by doctors, while the Nigerian society is more pharmacist-oriented like in many developed countries. Pharmacist is a highly respected community in Nigeria. Nigeria manufactures common essential formulations like Paracetamol, multi-vitamin, iron and common household remedies and IV fluids. On the other hand, India manufactures most of the latest drugs in the world apart from regular ones. Nigeria has to depend on APIs on India and China. However, some packaging material is available within the country itself.
What are your plans with regard to India, especially in view of the improved cooperation between India and Africa in the field of health?
We have been doing tie-ups with various companies and are trying to take their products to the Nigerian market so that Nigerians can get a complete range of affordable medicines. We are also looking at aspects of providing better healthcare to Nigerians with hospital tieups, technology transfers in areas of healthcare.
Please tell us about key initiatives Dana Pharma has undertaken to improve healthcare delivery?
Dana Drugs has taken initiatives in CSR activities like deworming the children of Nigeria. We did this exercise in most of the schools in two states and now we are focusing on anaemic women in Nigeria.
How Dana Pharma utilises ICT to improve its efficiency and services?
We use IT software in our manufacturing activity. We will be shortly using apps to control and monitor our sales people and in many more areas like human resource, etc.
Organiser
Host Partner
Corporate Industry Interview View
Marriott Hotel & Convention Centre, Hyderabad, 10th February 2017
sHri
K. CHaNDrasHEKar rao Hon’ble Chief Minister, Telangana
Chief Guest
spECial guEsT sHri BoNTHu ram moHaN Mayor Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation
sHri K T rama rao Hon’ble Minister IT, Municipal Administration & Urban Development, Telangana
programmE CHair
Dr B JanarDhan reDDy Commissioner Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation
The conference will be a unique forum for idea exchange, knowledge sharing, networking, exploring opportunities for collaboration, while setting the policy agenda to meet future challenges in Urban Development.
Invited Speakers @ Urban Development Summit, Hyderabad Shri S P Singh Chief Secretary Government of Telangana Smt Ranjeev R Acharya Special Chief Secretary Higher Education Government of Telangana Shri Durga Shanker Mishra Additional Secretary Ministry of Urban Development Shri Praveen Prakash Joint Secretary Swachh Bharat Mission, Ministry of Urban Development, Government of India Shri Rajeshwar Tiwari Principal Secretary Health, Medical & Family Welfare Government of Telangana Shri Sunil Sharma Principal Secretary Transport, Road & Building Department Government of Telangana
Smt Chitra Ramchandran Secretary Housing Department Government of Telangana Shri Jayesh Ranjan Secretary Department of IT, Government of Telangana Shri Navin Mittal Secretary, Municipal Administration & Urban, Development Government of Telangana Smt Christina Z Chongthu Managing Director Telangana State Tourism, Development Corporation Shri K Shashanka Commissioner Karimnagar Municipal Corporation Ms Shruti Ojha Commissioner Greater Warangal Municipal Corporation ...and many more
Participation From • Ministry of Urban Development, Government of India • Ministry of Road Transport & Highways, Government of India • Ministry of Electronics & Information Technology, Government of India • Ministry of Health & Family Welfare, Government of India • State Urban Development Departments • State Transport Departments • Smart City Corporations • State IT Departments • PSUs • National Institute of Urban Affairs (NIUA) • Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC) ...and many more
Key Themes Cost and Benefits of Urbanization in India | Best & Next Practices of Smart Cities from Across India | Housing & Slum Upgrading | Planning & Design | Water & Sanitation | Solid & Liquid Waste Management | Energy | Effective Transportation for Smart Mobility | Sustainable Urban Transportation | Culture for Sustainable Urban Development - The Way Ahead | Smart Education | Smart Health
For Queries Contact: Fahimul Haque | urbansummit@egovonline.net | +91-8860651632 HEAD OFFICE Elets Technomedia (P) Ltd.
Stellar IT Park, Office No. : 7A/7B, 5th Floor, Annexe Building C-25, Sector 62, Noida, Uttar Pradesh - 201309, India Ph: +91-120-4812600
MIDDLE EAST OFFICE Elets Technomedia Pvt Ltd (FZE) SAIF Desk Q1 - 05 - 130/A P. O. Box: 124939, Sharjah, U.A.E
telangana.eletsonline.com | #elets_telangana
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Industry View
Innovating to
TAKE ON CANCER
Distinguished service provider Cancer Genetics, Inc. (CGI) has a proven track record of simplifying issues faced by oncologists by offering them critical and clinically actionable information, says Dr. Mandar Kulkarni, CTO of Cancer Genetics, Inc. in an interview with Elets News Network (ENN). How is cancer diagnostic landscape evolving in India?
Effective early diagnosis is the cornerstone of efficient clinical management of cancer. Majority of oncologists in India depend on their clinical experience and rely heavily on gold standard testing methods, although the neo-oncological precision medicine approach has begun to emerge as an important component of the cancer diagnostic paradigm. The precision oncology approach exploits technological advances in DNA sequencing to identify several ‘cancer driving’ mutations from an individual’s tumor, and is used to improve treatment outcomes by predicting tumour behaviour and the patient’s response to the chosen drug regimens. Several organic efforts, including cancer screening camps and general
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health screenings, continue to raise awareness about early and accurate detection of cancer in India. Easy access to information about the impact of the state-of-the-art DNA sequencing methods on making better therapeutic choices is increasing the demand of such testing in the Indian market. There has been an increase in the development of drugs that target cancer promoting genomic changes and warrant testing for the presence of such changes in each cancer patient prior to choosing drug regimens. The affording urban population is demanding clinical cancer management inline with that available in developed countries. All these factors, although highly conducive for rapid adoption of advanced precision oncology testing, are outweighed by the inability of a much larger non-urban Indian pop-
ulation that cannot bear the high cost of these tests offered in a highly price sensitive market. Therefore, adoption of advanced precision oncology tests is currently limited to a small sub-section of the society from tier one cities. At the same time, several service providers that offer such tests are focusing effort on modifying the tests to lower costs yet maintain the utility and quality of the test. Lastly, in the interest of high quality testing that can save lives of cancer patients, a regulatory framework that qualifies clinical service providers is required.
What are the key solutions being offered by CGI?
CGI has an established track record of developing many solutions that detect several mutations and other genomic aberrations from tumour
Industry View
tissues or liquid biopsies (circulating tumor cells, circulating tumor DNA or cell-free DNA). The clinical relevance and the collective impact of all changes detected in the tumour allow medical directors at CGI to effectively interpret the data and provide a report to the medical oncologist so that s/ he may choose the most effective approach for clinical management of the patient. Cancer Genetics India offers sequencing of a panel of 50 genes that are generally mutated in solid tumors such as breast, colon, lung, gastrointestinal, and ovarian. DNA extracted from clinical samples is tested for mutations in genes that are targeted for therapy (e.g. Her2 targeted by trastuzumab or lapatinib, EGFR targetted by cetuximab or erlotinib, KIT, RET, PDGF-Rs, VEGF-Rs targeted by sunitinib). Mutations in other genes included in the panel maybe indicative of the invasiveness of the tumour. Such information is useful for the physician to set the patient’s expectations about therapeutic management and outcome. At CG-India we plan on continuing to build on this offering and bring state-of-theart NGS-based cancer diagnostic capabilities from the western world to the Indian community. Conducting studies that focus on re-validating a few NGS-based diagnostic panels for the Indian population and developing novel panels relevant to the Indian market are on our priority list.
Who are your key collaborators in India? Please tell us about your recent projects implemented here?
We collaborate with several super-specialty cancer hospitals as well as academic cancer centers to develop and validate precision oncology solutions and to enable discovery projects in the translational oncology area. One of our current projects focuses on validating a fluorescence in situ hybridisation based FHACT test to detect cervical cancer from abnormal pap smears. Another project is to identify a genomic signature/ biomarker for early detection of oral cancer. We are validating several multigene panels for improved patient
stratification and therapeutic guidance in lung cancer and leukemia patients. Lastly, we are working towards assessing the utility of a multigene test that will predict response to immune-therapy for lung cancer.
What are the key challenges faced by healthcare providers in diagnosis of cancer?
One of the major challenges faced by oncologists is that they have a wide array of therapeutic agents to choose from. Prior to the advent of targetted therapies the choice was guided primarily by clinical experience and tumor type. Today we have several targeted therapies to choose from. Each drug is specifically designed to attack tumor cells that harbour the targetted genomic change. Without the knowledge of the genomic changes driving tumor growth choosing the most efficacious drug is challenging. More recently, immunotherapy has added a new dimension to clinical management of cancer. The efficacy of drugs that block immuno-suppression and enable the patient’s immune system to attack the tumour can be predicted by genomic testing as well. Large data volumes and complex data interpretation schemes present another challenge for clinicians. Distinguished service providers like CGI have a strong track record of simplifying these problems and presenting only the critical and clinically actionable information to clinicians.
tionised our approach and has enabled us to take big strides in the area of precision oncology. Continued decrease in the cost of sequencing, the increased ease of operating the sequencing machines, and decreasingly complex workflows for performing genomic tests is expected to drive adoption of these tests. Automation in the “data-to-reporting” pipelines will also greatly affect the timeline and accuracy of obtaining clinically actionable information for each patient. Field deployable miniaturized sequencers, and innovative approaches to enrichment of genomic targets for testing are expected to contribute significantly to improving the laboratory workflows.
Please apprise us about your future expansion plans.
We are currently focusing on building a comprehensive portfolio of personalized oncology testing services. We are also supporting efforts for the discovery of new genomic biomarkers for early detection of cancer. We intend to transform our bioinformatics facility into a center-of-excellence to support discovery pipelines as well as automate the clinical reporting workflows.
Which technological innovations according to you look promising in containing the rising incidences of cancer?
Next generation sequencing technology has already revolu-
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Industry View
BUILDING INFIRMARIES for Life
Having delivered a wide array of projects ranging from upgradation of existing medical departments to development of new hospital on turnkey basis, Sunil Agarwal, Country Head of Enraf Nonius Projects India Ltd, sees innumerous opportunities for cooperation between Indian and Dutch healthcare sectors in areas ranging from R&D of new medicines to healthcare products, in conversation with Elets News Network (ENN). Excerpts:
As a supplier of turnkey healthcare projects, what are the key opportunities you see emerging in India?
The Indian healthcare industry is very advanced and we can learn a lot from it. India offers innovative, sustainable and affordable healthcare solutions for a large population. There are many potential fields for co-operation ranging from research and development of new medicines to healthcare products. However, the healthcare delivery market is not
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well balanced. There is a big well developed private market in India, but the services of the public market are not so well organised as compared to the private sector, which is a big challenge. The Netherlands, where Enraf Nonius Projects India Ltd’s parent company Enraf-Nonius B.V. is based, is home to a vibrant life science health cluster of more than 2,200 life science and medi tech companies and research organisations – all within a 120-mile radius. Holland is the most
geographically concentrated region in the world when it comes to creating economic and social value in life science and health. The LSH sector includes a number of closely related industries including Philips, a world leader in medical imaging and patient monitoring, and DSM, a biomaterials leader. Expertise in healthcare infrastructure is characterised by a turn-key plus approach. Dutch companies are able to cover all aspects ranging from hospital design and engineering, financing
Industry View
and waste management to medical equipment while paying special attention to energy efficiency and healing enjoinments. The excellent medical research infrastructure is strongly focused on translational research in different medical fields such as oncology, cardiovascular, immunology and neuroscience. Our company is a global market leader in mobile healthcare, which enables to contribute to rural healthcare in developing countries around the globe. We have an excellent research and innovation portfolio in a number of niches, such as vaccination, antibiotic resistance and polio. Dutch healthcare ranks number one compared to the US, Australia, New Zealand, Germany and Canada. The Netherlands is consistent number one in the ranking of the Euro-Health Consumer Index. India has a lot to contribute to the Netherlands healthcare sector by offering joint research and opening up the market for joint development of equipment and medical devices. The management for running a private hospital could be of added value to the Dutch system.
What are the key target markets for EN-Projects?
As a turnkey contractor we design, build, equip, train, maintain and finance and we are open to any market across the globe.
What are the key components of a world-class hospital and how do you put them together?
The key components of a world-class hospital include hospital building and infrastructure; healthy aging including rehabilitation; health systems strengthening including e-health and management; medical devices, equipment and medical technology; education and training; best practice sharing and alignment with national health policies of the respective countries. We bring all these components together to deliver a world-class infrastructure.
Being involved in all develop-
KEY PROJECTS DELIVERED WORLDWIDE ♦ Sri Lanka Ministry of Health -- Hambantota Hospital ♦ Sri Lanka Ministry of Health -- Nuwara Eliya Hospital ♦ Ghana Ministry of Health -- Winneba Specialist Trauma Hospital ♦ Ghana Ministry of Health -- Tarkwa District Hospital ♦ China -- Shaoxing Hospital ♦ China -- Dalian Hospital ♦ Saint Lucia -- EU Owen King Hospital ♦ Saint Lucia -- Dental Clinics ♦ UAE -- Kalba Hospital ♦ Gambia Ministry of Health & Social Welfare -- annual drugs supply ♦ Gambia Ministry of Health & Social Welfare -- Serekunda, Bwiam and Soma Hospitals ♦ Ghana Ministry of Health, 16 Rehabilitation Centres ♦ Ghana Ministry of Health, 21 dental clinics ♦ Indonesia Police Department, 7 Police Hospitals ♦ Indonesia Ministry of Health, 54 Medical Rehabilitation Centres ♦ Nigeria Ministry of Health, National doping laboratory ♦ Mexico, PESP energy efficient Hospital design ♦ China Ministry of Health, Koshin Beck and Rehabilitation Centres ♦ Philippines, Adventist Hospital ♦ Niger Ministry of Health, Niamey Hospital ♦ Libya Ministry of Health, Al Baida Hospital ♦ Libya Ministry of Education, Garyounis University Medical Hospital ♦ Kenya, Kenyatta Hospital Pharmacy Production Department ♦ Jordan, National Oil CO. Ras Lanuf Hospital ment phases of a healthcare facility, what are the major challenges you face in markets like Asia, Africa and Middle-East?
The challenges we faced in the market like Asia, Africa and Middle East include accessibility due to poor health care infrastructure; affordability owing to low relative purchasing power; and uncertain government relations.
How had been the bygone year for EN-Projects? What are your targets for 2017 and beyond?
2016 was a fantastic year for us.
Many projects are there in pipeline. We are dealing with Government of Telangana for construction of a 4,250 bed hospital and we are also building a 2,000 bed hospital in Andhra Pradesh. We have an ongoing 250-bed hospital project in Suriname and a 200-bed hospital in Fizi. We have received grants from the Dutch goverment for a project in Mozambique, a 300-bed hospital in Papua New Guinea, a 250-bed healthcare facility for Cape Vedra and Jamaica. We are also in touch with the Government of Iran and the Republic of the Congo for hospital projects. All these projects will be financed, designed, built and equipped by Enraf Nonius group.
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Corporate Interview
TECHNOLOGY
for Healthcare Delivery Bridging the learning and knowledge-sharing gap among the Indian medical community, Docplexus -- an online networking platform for clinicians -- is growing from strength to strength by empowering doctors and improving healthcare outcomes for millions of Indian patients. Phanish Chandra, CEO and Co-founder, Docplexus, speaks to Elets News Network (ENN) about the company’s partnerships, impact it has created and future expansion plans. What is the vision behind Docplexus? How did you conceive the idea of establishing this company?
Docplexus was conceived with the intention of leveraging technology to improve healthcare delivery in India. It all started after the tragic death of my younger brother from neurocysticercosis. Delay in diagnosis was the primary cause of his demise. This was a major shock for the entire family, most of whom were doctors themselves. The incident revealed the gross deficiencies in the existing systems of learning and knowledge-sharing amongst the Indian medical community. I resolved to change this and created Docplexus - an online networking platform for clinicians to access latest medical news, discuss clinical cases and learn. Docplexus’ vision is to empower doctors and improve healthcare outcomes for millions of Indian patients every year.
Which service offerings of Docplexus differentiate it from other platforms connecting doctors to diagnose and treat patients?
Docplexus is equipped to host clinical discussions, surveys, surgical videos, live webinars, CME programmes and KOL interviews. Our partnership with Coliquio GmBH, a German healthcare startup, allows us to harness their rich experience in the European market, particularly in client engagement. Our strength lies in the fact that we are the only Indian platform with both, a web and mobile presence. This gives our users more choice and convenience. Our web app allows for seamless integration of all of our offerings.
What kind of impact has the company been able to create in healthcare sector of India?
Docplexus is India’s largest and fastest growing online doctor community. We enjoy the trust of 165,000 physicians for their learning and networking needs. Over 12,000 doctors log onto our platform daily. We have already hosted 12,000 clinical case discussions and 75 interactions with KOLs comprising eminent international faculty, industry pioneers and recipients of prestigious awards. Our CME programmes and KOL interviews have narrowed the gap between doctors’ learning needs and traditional solutions. This has equipped doctors with the knowledge and skills to deliver better treatment and care. It is immensely satisfying to see Docplexus bring about such positive impact on Indian healthcare.
What are your future expansion plans? Where do you see Docplexus heading in five years from now?
Docplexus is steadily progressing towards its goal of reaching 200,000 members by March 2017 and 400,000 members in the next three years. Our ultimate vision is to empower each and every practitioner of modern medicine in India and create better clinical outcomes for 100 million patients each year.
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