Indian healthcare dotcoms are in a furious race to build networks of doctors. They will have to build a clear value proposition for doctors to jump online.

By Vinod Mahanta

I'm no doctor to tell you this: medicine on the net will be hot. Note the future tense. As the dwindling fortunes of sites like drkoop.com and webmd.com testify, round 1 of e-health has been a flop-in the US, mind you. Even so, healthcare information is the most sought after on the net after sex and money. The challenge, clearly, is to use the net to standardise communication among doctors, hospitals, labs, insurance companies, pharmacies, and patients to build one helluva superhighway.

Imagine getting this in place... in India. That's what desi healthcare dotcoms are trying to do: build network of doctors. Get them, and everything else will follow. The task of networking is huge: there are 5.5 lakh doctors in India. But then, the stakes are high: the total size of Indian healthcare industry is $18 billion. ''The cost of travel, accommodation and time, apart from the anxiety of unfamiliar territory and delays involved make a compelling case for tele-medicine,'' stresses Chetan Shetty, CEO, doctoranywhere.com.

The spread of doctors is skewed in the country. Almost all the specialists (some 40,000) reside in large cities. So, in theory, these networks could allow doctors to exchange ideas, experiences, and information while being on the move. Patients would benefit too, as most prefer dealing with doctors and hospitals as primary sources of information. Doctors could consult, see reports, and even order hospital supplies online (onhospitals.com, for one, caters to this niche). And then, legislation permitting, these dotcoms see potential linkages-and alluring commissions-with insurance, billing, even prescriptions...mind you, all this is far, far in the future.

Mobility

So, for starters, it all hinges on wiring up the doctors. Like in the US, access tools like PDAs and mobile phones are being touted. There is a premium on mobility. ''We have to be able to deliver to a moving target who can be in office, home, or some other city,'' explains A. Suryanarayan, CEO, medybiz.com. But given the low penetration of PDAs, this will take time to materialise. That hasn't stopped Antfactory-funded indegene.com from working on a plan to equip doctors with palmtops souped up with specialised healthcare applications.

Since many doctors in cities have PCs, healthcare portals are advocating PC-based solutions. The favored solution is a desktop, which aids doctors in clinic management, storage, and retrieval of patients' records-as well as transmit, via the web-site, records for second opinion, or even to a hospital for pre-admission.

Adds Chetan Shetty, CEO, doctoranywhere.com: ''We have to design a system that uses regular desktop equipment keeping in view the conditions prevalent in the country.'' Doctoranywhere, for instance, has initiated tie-ups with Compaq and Global Finance for the boxes. Chimes in C. Chandrashekhar, Deputy GM, docmednet. com: ''The complete infotech solution will include practice enhancement tools, access to medical information, patient education, image repositories, and other value-added e-commerce services.'' Basically, set up a community.

Training

Training of doctors will be an essential part of building the network. Indegene is developing online learning tools for the medical community. It is also lobbying to enforce periodic training for doctors, as is the norm in many countries. ''The PDAs and PCs will be successful only when we create a need first by educating doctors on net,'' points out K.S. Sudheer, CEO, medi-times.com, which claims to have trained about 2,500 doctors. On the other hand, sites like onhospitals.com plan to wire up hospitals by placing net-enabled PCs in canteens, doctors' duty rooms, and hospital libraries. Similarly, Max Healthcare will open 30 primary health centres in and around Delhi and link up with four diagnostic Max medicentres for secondary healthcare. Finally, the big hospitals are online too: Apollo Hospital in Chennai is linked with a 50-bed hospital in Arogoda for online consultations.

The credibility of the content being provided by the networks is an issue. Doctors have to be sure about the sources of information. ''The critical issue is that network should be neutral and efficient, and people who are developing content should be qualified doctors,'' says Dr Rajesh Nair, co-founder, Indegene. The Bangalore-based portal has exclusive contracts with 14 leading medical journals and 12 large medical conferences in India. Other sites get doctors to write; medibiz.com, for instance, has 36 doctors on the content rolls. ''Doctors will graduate to transactions only after they are satisfied with the medical education being provided on the net,'' avers Ganesh Arnal, CEO, mdspeak.com.

Future

It goes without saying that low levels of pc penetration in the medical community affects plans of these networkers. There is also the lack of a clear value proposition for doctors to prompt them to switch to an 'e-environment'. In any case, wherever PCs are available with doctors, they are not using them as an aid in practice-as their clinical workflow does not centre around the PC. ''We are participating in the changing of doctors' mindset and technology usage patterns. This is a gradual process,'' warns Nair.

It is indeed. It's clearly a long way before a seamless online medical chain can emerge. Sure, there's an incentive: the medical industry's notorious inefficiency. But there's lots of work to be done yet. Till now, there was no legal requirement for storage of medical records. But now, with consumer issues and insurance requirements cropping up, maintaining records will be necessary. The data repository which emerges out of this network will be a large source of drug development inputs.

Anyway, here's how it should work, as some say, as early as 2005: Dr. Ghosh has an emergency; his patient has collapsed. The good doctor fishes out his PDA and quickly checks out the electronic medical records, which show a history of cardiac problems. While waiting for online lab results, Ghosh asks for a second opinion from a noted cardiologist. Prescription done, the wired hospital gets a room ready, and stocks it with the requisite medicines. The patient's insurance company is brought into the picture...and so on. If this is to be the future, there is no further-removed reality. Over to you, Doc.

Issue Contents  Write to us   Subscriptions   Syndication 

INDIA TODAY |  INDIA TODAY PLUS | COMPUTERS TODAY
TEENS TODAY | NEWS HOME | MUSIC TODAY | ART TODAY | CARE TODAY

© Living Media India Ltd