The Hindu Business Line : Philips Healthcare looks at popularising life-saving device

Someday soon, your car could have a life-saving device riding alongside the audio, the TV, the satellite navigator and other fixtures. That is, if medical equipment manufacturers succeed in making their point.

Cars, aircraft, trains, offices, homes, bus stands, stadia, convention centres, malls and public places — these are the new venues that medical equipment manufacturers are eyeing to place one of their cardiac care items, the automatic external defibrillator (AED). Not long ago, the automatic external defibrillator, a portable device that revives a person from sudden heart arrests, belonged in hospitals, rarely with doctors.

In talks with auto cos

Medical device makers are realising the potential of the out-of-hospital market and increasing the thrust on it, especially for these defibrillators, says Mr Jitesh Mathur, Philips Healthcare’s General Manager (Patient Monitoring and Critical Care). Philips is talking to automobile companies and their apex body SIAM (Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers) to have them installed at their offices and also in the cars they make.

So far, apart from its own offices, it has installed defibrillators at the offices of General Motors, Fidelity Investments, Agilent Technologies; in the aircraft of carriers Kingfisher and Paramount; Mumbai and Delhi airports and shop floors.

However, all this is in addition to its larger push on selling the hospital-based MRI, X-ray, CT-scanners and ultrasounds.

“India has one of the highest incidences of sudden cardiac arrests, which will be fatal if not attended to in the first ten minutes. We want to reach out wherever (an) SCA (threat) exists,” Mr Mathur said. “Virtually all public places like offices, airports, railway stations, buses, buildings, stadiums, markets and malls are target markets for the AED.”

Pop marketing

Philips, which says it has the largest AED market share for its versions and 50 per cent of the domestic market, is also the only one with USFDA (US Food and Drug Administration) clearance to sell it over the counter for home use.

“We are moving towards 250 AED installations in India for public access. The home installation market is also picking up, with 10 AEDs deployed.” The device costs Rs 1-2 lakh apiece.

AED sales have risen globally in the last five years, though it is new to India. Revenue-wise, he said, “The out-of-hospital segment means a lot to us though it forms barely 10 per cent of the critical care sector. The retail or out-of-hospital market requires major understanding and we are working towards it.”

Philips is driving a campaign through the Society for Emergency Medicine India, and learning from lifestyle products to simplify its new models. GE is another global player while BPL Healthcare has defibrillators in the domestic market.

The scene is a far cry from Japan or Korea where a single metro train has 25 defibrillators. “The industry’s final frontier,” according to Mr Mathur, “is to make the AED as ubiquitous as the fire extinguisher.”

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