COVID-19 has accelerated uptake of virtual communication in every facet of our lives and telemedicine with ever increasing users is here to stay. In early 2020, when the government of India was getting ready to handle COVID-19 patients, teleconsultations was one of the key technologies considered. People who were home quarantined could dial-up doctors and take the necessary medical help. This proved quite a successful method to bring doctors and medical care closer to the people, even during challenging times.
Indeed, telemedicine came into the limelight during the last two years owing to the new normal of travel restrictions and inaccessibility of physical contact. Raman Singh, 41 had a tingling sensation in his right hand in the afternoon after a game of cricket with his son, in Nov 2020 during the first phase of the pandemic. He ignored it. By late evening he started to experience chest pain but it was already late and finding a doctor seemed impossible due to COVID-19 restrictions. Compounding the problem was his location. At the time he was living at the outskirts of Faridabad. Luckily, he consulted a local doctor on the phone, who in turn arranged a consultation with an expert cardiologist. In 30-min, an ambulance was arranged and Singh was on the way to the hospital in a nearby city. He had experienced a heart attack. Timely access to medical care saved his life. Telemedicine made this possible.
Telemedicine continues to be a useful tool for patients who need constant care and monitoring like people with diabetes. A new age telemedicine company based at Bangalore, pioneered a telemedicine program for people with diabetes who needed wound care during the pandemic. Many people who have diabetes have wounds or ulcers that take longer to heal and can cause infections. A picture of the wound or ulcer was uploaded on the app and a care provider could instruct the person on how to clean and take care of the wound. The company would also send a trained nurse to take care of the infection if the wound did not heal. Medicines and other things for wound care like antiseptic and gauge were also home delivered by the company. Then it would connect to the local doctor or diabetologist of the patient to provide further treatment. This convenience is much valued by the patient and their families and also the doctor, who can better care for his patient.
Routine diagnostic checks through telemedicine and consultations helped many people throughout the pandemic. Now, teleconsultations have become popular even in rural India. An initiative of the ministry of health and family welfare, the national telemedicine service, eSanjeevani, is looking at about 90,000 patients a day across the country since its launch in April, 2020.
While the government’s push for telemedicine has certainly helped the patients, a swarm of private telemedicine providers have also swept across the country in the past two years. From start-ups to established brands like Tatas have all frayed into the telemedicine market. The regular hospitals have also ramped-up their telemedicine departments. This has helped the patient who has more options to pick and choose the platform and provider they would like to go to.
Doctors are also finding this medium helpful to not only reach out to the patients but also to their peers. A cardiology whatsapp group started in Mangalore by a veteran cardiologist has been so successful that a number of similar groups have been formed across India. When a doctor sees a patient with a heart problem, he can do a test called ECG (electrocardiogram) to check if the heart is functioning properly. However, some ECG results can only be read by experienced cardiologists. The doctor uploads the ECG on the whatsapp group and within minutes gets expert advice on treatment options for the patient. This helps the doctor to save lives even without physical access to specialist doctors.
Telemedicine enables remote evaluation, diagnosis and treatment of patients of all age groups. Consider the anxiety of a new mother whose toddler has fever. Telemedicine provides access to primary health and a specialist doctor at critical times. Also by linking telemedicine to online pharmacy and at home diagnostic services helps solve the problem of access to healthcare.
Not to mention the fact that telemedicine saves time and reduces the cost-of-care for the providers as well as the care seeker. For a person with diabetic foot ulcer in a remote location the cost of travel along with the loss-of-pay adds to the cost-of-care. This is the reason people neglect or postpone timely medical care resulting in bigger medical illness. Telemedicine helps solve this problem.
For people with other medical conditions such as cancer or kidney disease constant monitoring and management of day-to-day problems are required. Telemedicine has become a useful tool for such persons and their families. Information on nutrition intake, adverse reactions to medicine or adjustment of the dose of medicine can all be done without travelling to the doctor’s clinic.
Other specialties that are most sought after on telemedicine platforms are primary healthcare, Gynecology, Pediatrics, Dermatology, ENT and sexology. The recent launch of Pradhan Mantri Digital Health Mission (PM-DHM) will further strengthen telemedicine in India. With the availability of online patient records and unique health ID will streamline telemedicine access.
However, sharing of information and data privacy are still roadblocks that the telemedicine providers find difficult to navigate. Such infrastructures that not only make data accessible but also secure are the need of the moment. Much like the banking and finance sector that was revolutionised with the digital movement, healthcare through telemedicine can also be truly democratised.
Source: financialexpress.com
