India's Most Remote Villages Are Getting Better Healthcare With This Cloud-Based Solution PDF

2/11/2019 India's Most Remote Villages Are Getting Better Healthcare With This Cloud-Based Solution
EDITOR'S PICK | 15,437 views | Nov 21, 2016, 05:24am
India's Most Remote Villages Are

Getting Better Healthcare With
This Cloud-Based Solution
Suparna Dutt D'Cunha Contributor
I cover startups & enterprises in India and the UAE.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/suparnadutt/2016/11/21/indias-most-remote-villages-are-getting-better-healthcare-with-this-cloud-based-solution/#197c9964593b 1/10
A patented digital health solution, called Re MeDi, developed by Neurosynaptic is used in 2,200 villages in
India. (Photo Courtesy Shutterstock)
In India, public health care is free, yet years of under-investment in public

health means that facilities are also grossly understaffed and under-equipped.
The country also has a massive resource gap of over 4 million health workers
and, to compound problems, nearly 60% of existing health workers practice in
urban areas.
With 70% of its people living in villages, often far from health care providers, it's
clear that there’s a lot of room for affordable health services to grow in India.
Aiming to bridge the poor health infrastructure gap in rural areas and tap into
the $125 billion health care market, Sameer Sawarkar and Rajeev
Kumar, founders of health technology company Neurosynaptic
Communications, have built a cloud-based, point of care diagnostic equipment
and telemedicine solution that enables remote health care delivery.  
Called ReMeDi (Remote Medical Diagnostics), it's a comprehensive low-cost
digital health solution, which empowers its over 8,000 health technicians — with
little or no college education — to act as a proxy for doctors in rural areas. The
technicians operate it in 2,200 villages across India, with a total population of 50
million people.
“ReMeDi links up health workers, health clinics, pharmacies, diagnostic labs,

doctors, and central medical facilities. It has been built taking into consideration
the skill-set and infrastructure issues, and hence can be operated even at low
bandwidth by semi-skilled operators, with a little training,” says Sawarkar,
adding that ReMeDi solution, launched in 2008, is also used by hospitals, clinics
and non-governmental organizations.
Using ReMeDi, health technicians provide video and audio connect between
patients located in rural areas and remotely located physicians, enabling real-
time consultations. For example, when a patient arrives at the village center, the
health technician takes vital signs, conducts basic diagnostic tests, and adds all
relevant information into the electronic health record. The patient summary is
sent to an offsite doctor, who makes a diagnosis and sends it back to the clinic
with a prescription or referral for further care.
Rajeev Kumar and Sameer Sawarkar of Neurosynaptic. (Photo Courtesy Neurosynaptic)
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The indigenous technology that integrates the end-to-end health care ecosystem
was developed by Sawarkar and Kumar, both electronics and communication
engineers by profession, along with the Indian Institute of Technology,
Madras. Globally, other groups working on similar medical diagnostics projects
for remote areas include MIT's open-source health project Sana, Intelehealth,
founded by students at Johns Hopkins University, and CliniPAK developed by
US-based company VecnaCares.
In India, the health care system is struggling with rising costs and uneven
quality so it was important, Sawarkar says, to achieve the best outcome at the
lowest cost, with the help of technology. Both the World Health Organization
and India's Rural Health Mission consider the use of technology imperative to
bringing better health care to India’s most vulnerable people. “Our challenge
was to effectively tap into the $125 billion health care industry. And building a
technology-driven health care delivery business that makes a difference in the
health of the people living in rural areas was the right thing to do,” says
Sawarkar.
“We have carried out more than a million consultations so far, and charges for
basic consultation is less than a dollar,” he adds. Apart from India, ReMeDi
technology is used in eight other developing countries, including Bangladesh,

Senegal, Kenya and Ghana.
Gallery: Top Technology Trends

For 2017
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Although telemedicine units have been around for a while, they are dependent
on high-speed broadband, so are less useful. But this e-health solution can
operate with low bandwidth, meaning even slow connections can load and use
the ReMeDi platform, thereby increasing its functionality in rural communities.
“It can operate on laptops, mobile phones and tablets, and has a cloud-based
back-end, allowing complete anytime-anywhere access to health care,” says
Sawarkar (backend as a service enables to manage a centralized database and

lets the users share content via the cloud).
In India, the healthcare resources are heavily urban biased, says Sawarkar.
“Access to basic health care is a big challenge in rural India since 80% of doctors,
75% pharmacies and 60% of hospitals are in urban areas. High rates of chronic
absenteeism at government-aided rural clinics and unqualified private
practitioners add to the distress,” says Sawarkar.
As a result, 80% of Indians seek private healthcare. Around 40% of the

population either borrow money or sell assets to pay for hospitalization, and 25%
fall below the poverty line as a result of medical expenses each year, according to
National Accounts Statistics.
“Shockingly, for the rural population, health care is 1.5 times costlier because
treatment is sought very late in disease-cycle, resulting in huge expenses. Nearly
80% of health care financing is out of pocket, and millions of Indians in rural
areas get pushed below the poverty line every year because of health care
expenditure,” adds Sawarkar.
Before, people would have had to travel hundreds of miles, often spending a
month's wages, to see a doctor. But remote diagnoses and access to quality
health care at the primary level save patients time and money. As a result,
Sawarkar says, people are less likely to delay care.
“We have observed that with quality remote consultation, 76% of patients do not
have to go beyond their village for medical care. With improvements in
connectivity and point of care diagnostic technologies, things will get better,” he
adds.
Meanwhile, Sawarkar says, grants from Grand Challenges Canada, a Canadian

government program that provides seed funding for transformative solutions to
global health problems, and Technology Development Board of India are aiding
to develop its technological capabilities and products. They are also finding
support for their efforts from investors. In October, the company won its second
round of funding from Healthquad, Axilor Ventures and the Indian Angel
Network. Refusing to disclose the amount raised from the investors, Sawarkar
says, “In the past five years, we have been generating revenues based on our
sales-support-customization model. But our business dynamics has changed
with the launch of pay-per-use model.”
With the Indian health care industry seeing a robust growth trajectory, expected
to become a $280 billion industry by 2020, Sawarkar plans to further expand in
India and globally in the next three years. “With a few international projects and
partnerships, we want to take our technology to 25 countries. In India, we aim to
reach out to 25% of the population. We aim to be the leader in developing
countries for quality and affordable health care technology,” says Sawarkar.
Suparna Dutt D'Cunha Contributor
I am interested in ideas and enterprises -- in all shapes, sizes and guises, whether well-
cooked or medium-rare. After working for most of my career in Dubai in different
newspapers, including Gulf News, I relocated to India and worked for The Times Group in
Pune. During my... Read More
109,074 views | Dec 5, 2018, 10:55am
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2/11/2019 India's Most Remote Villages Are Getting Better Healthcare With This Cloud-Based Solution

EDITOR'S PICK | 15,437 views | Nov 21, 2016, 05:24am

India's Most Remote Villages Are

In India, public health care is free, yet years of under-investment in public

“ReMeDi links up health workers, health clinics, pharmacies, diagnostic labs,

Rajeev Kumar and Sameer Sawarkar of Neurosynaptic. (Photo Courtesy Neurosynaptic)

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technology is used in eight other developing countries, including Bangladesh,

Gallery: Top Technology Trends

Sawarkar (backend as a service enables to manage a centralized database and

As a result, 80% of Indians seek private healthcare. Around 40% of the

Meanwhile, Sawarkar says, grants from Grand Challenges Canada, a Canadian

Suparna Dutt D'Cunha Contributor

109,074 views | Dec 5, 2018, 10:55am

What Will Finance Look Like In

Steven Ehrenhalt Brand Contributor

consulting services to ﬁnance organizations to help increase their contribution to company

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