Vijayawada: Telemedicine, a technology that makes the doctor in a city diagnose a patient in other city, with the help of videoconference and tools that are able to analyse the patient’s condition is becoming popular in Indian cities.
The hospitals are using the technology for different reasons. Some hospitals are using it for emergency care while some others are utilising it for consulting with doctors anywhere in the world. The hospitals are setting up telemedicine centres in towns with all required infrastructure for conducting tests in an emergency.
The centre will have a doctor with sufficient knowledge in emergency care round-the-clock. If a patient experienced a heart or brain stroke in a rural area, he may be shifted to the nearby telemedicine centre within an hour for expert advice. The in-charge doctor alerts the main hospital and a specialist reaches the telemedicine centre.
Dr P. Ramesh Babu, MD of Ramesh Hospitals said, “Nearly 80 per cent of the diseases can be diagnosed without touching the patient. In the telemedicine centres, the in-charge conducts tests and sends the reports to the main office in no time. The doctors in the main office see the reports on their smartphones and on the server which is connected to the machines in the centre with broadband connection.
“The doctor analyses the condition of the patients and refers the best option. This method saves the crucial time and helps the patient get life-saving advice in an emergency.”
A doctor in the government hospital said, “This technology can become a boon to the patients if it is incorporated in general hospitals in cities and PHCs in the rural areas. The specialists in the hospitals can diagnose the patients avoiding them travel for hours and spend hundreds of rupees as travelling expenses.”
The doctors say that this technology can be easily utilised if the hospitals are provided with broadband connection or the doctors have a 3G mobile connection for easy access of reports and videoconference.
