HEALTHCARE FOR THE OTHER INDIA -II

K. R. Balasubramanyam
Business Today (Edition: August 10, 2008)

Network to firm up

The District Hospital in Chamarajanagar, 185 km from Bangalore, stands out as the best example of how a private hospital can test the limits of a government programme. Narayana Hrudayalaya (NH) has taken over the cardiac care unit at the district hospital. It’s the NH team that runs the show here.

When the government and ISRO together launched the project in April 2002, they zeroed in on Chamarajanagar and the Vivekananda Memorial Hospital run by an NGO, at Saragur in Mysore district.

While the Chamarajanagar unit has so far provided telemedicine consultation to about 900 patients, the hospital at Saragur has progressed enough to offer speciality care in a few disciplines such as woman and child health, orthopaedics, pathology, etc.

First in telemedicine

After undergoing surgery at the Regional Cancer Centre (RCC), Thiruvananthapuram, patients need not visit the hospital for follow-up check-ups unless it’s necessary. They can visit any of RCC’s five Early Cancer Detection Centres across the state.

The prescription is dispensed via telemedicine. “Last year, about 2,500 patients had telemedicine follow-ups,” says RCC Director Dr Balakrishnan Rajan. The southern coastal state was the first to bring all its 14 district hospitals under ISRO’s telemedicine project. When it kick-started the programme five years ago, the place it selected promised maximum impact: Sabarimala, the holy town, which draws lakhs of pilgrims during winter months.

To go mobile

The third state to report full coverage, Rajasthan’s network of 32 district hospitals is the largest among the four states. They are connected to six medical colleges and the Sawai Man Singh (SMS) Hospital through VSAT.

Each district hospital is connected to one medical college and the SMS Hospital for providing super-speciality medical advice. Says Dr G. N. Saxena, Professor (Medicine), SMS Hospital and Chief Officer for Telemedicine in Rajasthan: “The project targets districts that are in need of medical advice in branches like cardiology, pathology, neurology, etc. So far, more than 2,300 patients have been treated this way.”

A hand that heals

Located a few kilometres from Chittoor, a small town in Andhra Pradesh best known for its sarees and jaggery, Apollo’s facility at Aragonda was the first in the country to provide telemedicine. Aragonda is the native place of Apollo Founder and Chairman Dr Prathap Reddy. Apollo provides its services free to villagers from Aragonda and surrounding villages. That’s great for Yugendar.

While trying to untangle his kite from electric wires, nine-year-old Yugendar inadvertently caught hold of a live wire and electrocuted himself, losing two fingers and suffering burn injuries on his arms and legs, where the power entered and exited his body. Rather than rush him to a nearby city for super-speciality care, his parents instead went to the local Apollo Hospital and after an initial check-up, the boy was remotely referred to Apollo Chennai for further diagnosis.

Stymied by the Naxals

Not many states can match Chhattisgarh’s record when it comes to telemedicine infrastructure. It was the second state to network all its 16 district hospitals under ISRO’s telemedicine project. Each of them can hook to a super-speciality hospital like the Government Medical College, Raipur, or Apollo Hospital, Bilaspur, or the All India Institute of Medical Sciences, Delhi. Even Escorts Hospital in Raipur has done its bit—it has stood in for the lack of cardiac care facility at the Raipur medical college.

When the Chhattisgarh government launched the project three years ago, it was introduced only in a few districts where communication facilities were reliable. Subsequently, it was extended to other places.