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The healthcare industry is now looking beyond basic and critical care, besides diagnostics for new business opportunities
Of late, there has been growing interest among investors in non-core businesses such as medical services at home and post-hospitalisation care.
According to Sateesh Andra, one of founders of the start-up Suvitas Holistic Healthcare Pvt Ltd, the Indian healthcare market is gradually going the US way with requirement and demand for hitherto uncommon services.
“For example, the need for post-hospitalisation care or transition care (care to be given to a patient after he is treated for critical ailments) is growing. If a patient gets a stroke he needs more attention after he gets critical care in the form of physiotherapy or even psychological counselling which cannot always be provided in a hospital,’’ he says.
Suvitas, which opened its first transition care facility in Hyderabad, has now lined up ₹150 crore investments in setting up similar facilities in about a dozen facilities across the country.
Likewise, the demand for medical services at home is also catching up.
The Nightingales, promoted by Medwell Ventures, sees an opportunity in this segment and pegs the market size at upwards of $3 billion.
It is now expanding by launching services in a number of locations, its co-founder and chairman Vishal Bali told BusinessLine in a recent interaction.
Key driversThe key drivers for these niche services are the fast-changing social profile and rise in nuclear families.
“Families in some sections of society are becoming increasingly nuclear and are looking for a place between hospital and home for better care. This is very popular in the US and will become so in India,’’ feels Andra. Then the environment too matters. For instance, a 15-year-old boy (name withheld) who had recently undergone a brain surgery has joined Suvitas transition care facility as he needs to undergo physiotherapy. His father, who is cop, preferred it because the physiotherapy is being offered along with specially designed video games!
Then there are home theatres and a well-stacked libraries among others which take away the psychological stigma of being in a hospital.
However, bringing these niche services to a commoner will still be a challenge in India.
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