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Next time someone needs urgent medical advice and is far from a hospital, help could be just a mobile phone call away.
Religare Technologies has teamed up with Airtel using Fortis Healthcare as its knowledge partner to offer 24x7 medical assistance on phone to mobile users. The service called Mediphone was soft launched early this month, and claims to be taking 1,000 calls a week already.
It enables Airtel customers to seek advice on ailments that are not life threatening for a fee of Rs 35 per consultation. This fee is deducted from the mobile phone bill. To access the service, the customer has to call 54445 from his or her mobile phone.
“The service is targeted at bridging the healthcare divide,” said Mr Ashish Vijh, Senior Vice-Presiden, mHealth, Religare Techologies, describing how it provides affordability and access.
Back-end at Noida
While catering mostly to non-acute ailments, the service, which uses a software engine licensed from Medibank, an Australian company, also has a built in process to handle emergencies. It tracks down the nearest hospital to the patient calling in and the patient is guided by the doctor or paramedic taking the call, till he or she reaches the hospital. Religare has set up a backend at Noida staffed by eight doctors and 20 paramedics.
Speaking to Business Line , Mr Shivinder Mohan Singh, Managing Director, Fortis Healthcare said, “This is a transformational project and if this works then the government should buy this platform and make it a free service for everyone.”
Right now, the service is available in Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Uttar Pradesh, J&K and Himachal Pradesh but eventually will be pan India, wherever Airtel's network is.
Key driver
Mobile is expected to be a huge driver of healthcare services given that it is low-cost and available round the clock. Last year, Aircel tied up with the Apollo hospital to launch medical consultation on the mobile. Apollo's Tele Triage provides basic healthcare for Rs 45 per consultancy. Earlier, in February, Religare Technologies had also set up Healthline 24x7, a phone and Web-based health information service, which helps the caller locate a doctor, or a lab or a chemist.
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