Carethics

Where there is a lack of quality information online for the health care of the elderly in India, Caring.com, a San Mateo-based start up is a worthy example.

As per the source, founded in 2007, Caring.com focuses on ‘eldercare’ related information such as healthcare, financial, legal and housing for the elderly. Two of the company’s three co founders are from Baby Centre, a Johnson & Johnson subsidiary.

In fact, Caring.com had raised $6 million in its first round of funding led by DCM and Split Rock Partners and has raised $10 million in a second round of funding led by Shasta Ventures. The site’s traffic growth and ad performance – display ads and sponsorships, were a great attraction for the investments.

Such platforms can serve as great means to provide valued, quality and aggregated information to users and can look at long term prospects of growth and self sustainence through ad revenues.

However , one does see a few such health care initiatives in India too such as www.bolohealth.com and hopes that this visionary initiative meets as much success as Caring.com.

While the benefits of IT in health care industry are apparent, yet its adoption in India is far below that in banking, commerce, travel, or any other industry. However the picture is not as bleak as it may appear. Many hospitals are working towards the use of innovative technology for better patient and health care.

According to the source, Apollo Hospitals is one such hospital. Apollo Hospitals is working on a project with Tata Consultancy Services that will give each of its patients a Universal Hospital Identification Number (UHIN). The number will provide any doctor anywhere across the globe, the patient’s entire medical history and records.

HealthHiway is another Apollo Hospital’s and industry initiative, which you should know about. As per the source, it will build and provide a comprehensive National Health Data Network, ensuring best global practices in healthcare processes and solutions. This will bring about an improvement in the key performance indicators—patient services, clinical outcome and financial health of user companies and result in satisfied patients.

In Indian hospitals, even today most of the information on each patient is entrusted to the individual doctor’s memory and instructions are passed down by word of mouth. In a hospital where work happens in shifts and there are three sets of nurses, three sets of ward boys, servers and duty doctors handling each patient, one can only imagine how some of the information is bound to be lost when passed down to all in charge of the patient.

Even the minutest information on hospital infections, allergic reactions, even bedsores can greatly affect a patient’s treatment and experience in the hospital. Thus, we see how a centralized automation system can solve this problem. As per the source, a hospital that has implemented, and is fully utilizing a Hospital Information System and Electronic Medical Records has seen to enhance its patient’s safety and reduce the potential for human error and oversight.

For example, proper record keeping of such minute but important details, also allows hospitals to identify and find the roots of recurring infections in the hospital. These can then be tracked to their source - poor sanitation, a negligent staff member, or improper monitoring of guests - and eliminated at the source itself.

Indian hospitals should look at automation for core medical needs, way beyond just administration work.

Though India has achieved some great feats on the economic front in the past decade, it has not managed to pass on the benefits to the health care sector as desired. As per the source, some 700 million people in India still lack access to care by specialists, partly because four out of five specialists live in urban areas far from the large rural population.

At such times it is a pleasure to have institutes like the Emergency Management and Research Institute (EMRI) – not-for-profit organization to implement technology-based solutions to bridge this gap.

With its 108 emergency-service number, EMRI provides free medical, police and fire emergencies in a number of states such as Andhra Pradesh, Gujarat, Uttarakhand, Goa, Chennai, Rajasthan, Karnataka, and Assam. It operates 1,300 technology backed ambulances in the country side of the aforesaid states, with web-based applications connecting the mobile units to hospitals and physicians. However, it plans to go national by 2010 with more than 10,000 ambulances.

So far, more than 3,000 hospitals have become members of the rural outreach program; in the first year itself 3,00,000 emergencies have been serviced and 11,500 lives have been saved!

In a digital age as this, if one has to still rely on physical medical records and manage the ever thickening folders of medical documents, that too when the Electronic Medical Records (EMR) system is already present at the patients’ disposal, it either reflects our ignorance or lack of motivation to adopt to the changes.

EMRs allow online access to the patients’ entire medical records and prescriptions and store the patients’ financial information. EMRs also allow generation of bills, automate processes and ensure availability of critical information without much running around.

According to the source, with 80% of India’s healthcare sector (growing at 16%annually- compounded) consisting of private players, the EMR system has been adopted by most of these with great enthusiasm. But the question is: ‘Is the system of EMR being utilized optimally?’

Resistance to adoption of newer technology by hospital staff has resulted in only 15-25% reduction in paperwork, despite EMR implementation. Besides EMR system is being used only for administration purposes rather than core health care purposes. Even where the system is being successfully utilized, it is done only in single hospitals and not across different healthcare service providers, though both have EMR systems implemented at their end. This is primarily due to lack of standardization.

Thus, for the successful implementation of the EMR system, it requires greater awareness, confidence, adoption and trust of newer technology.

From plain vanilla communication, the functions of mobile phones have increased beyond imagination. In the first phase, the only function of a mobile phone had been that of a telephone. Then came the camera and mp3 featured phones and now the internet and of course how can I not join the bandwagon of mentioning the 3G spectrum. Well, just in case you are wondering why I am talking about mobile phones on a healthcare site, below is the snap shot of yet another function that mobile phones are here to provide. That too for the health care segment!

‘Nursing Constellation Plus’ is one of the 10 most expensive iPhone applications, providing access to drug dosing calculation tools, medical dictionary, calculator, etc.