What is the current penetration of healthcare information technology (HIT) in India vis-a-vis China and the US? Why is it low? Enumerate the barriers/ challenges.
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Bipul Kumar Jha
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There is very low penetration of HIT in India as compared to developed countries like the US. The total spending on IT by the US hospitals in 2011 amounted to $79-80 billion compared to healthcare IT spending of $305 million in India. Top challenges are underfunding of public healthcare services, limited knowledge about applications of IT, shortage of trained manpower, huge initial investments and lack of stringent regulations.
What are the growth drivers for HIT in India? How have these changed over years and how are these expected to change further?
Some of the growth factors are increasing competition among private players for healthcare excellence, ever-increasing healthcare data volumes, advent of electronic health records (EHR). Over the years, the awareness has increased among private health providers and the vendors have focused on proving return on investment on their products and improved efficiency of the system post-implementation.
By how much (in percentage terms) has the penetration of EHR, mHealth, telemedicine and web-based services increased in India over the last five years? What are the projections for the next five years?
The penetration of EHR has been highest among all others, growing by 13.5 per cent. It is expected to have the same rate or increase due to improving uptake and upcoming hospital projects.
How do you see the rise of mHealth in India? Why has this not extended itself to the use of health apps by physicians and patients which is the norm in the US?
mHealth market in India is at a nascent stage with a majority of the initiatives having started in the last two to three years. There are more than 20 initiatives for mHealth in India. At present the mHealth sector in India is highly scattered. There are some players who have an all-India presence, while there are other initiatives present only in a few states or cities. Most of the mHealth applications used in India are in the wellness segment like calorie counter, heart rate counter and so on.
H IT, if accessible to tier II and III cities, could change healthcare delivery in Indian context.
Although very less, the healthcare groups present in tier II and III cities have also shown an increasing trend on uptake of technology. HIT vendors also have gradually moved their targets from metro cities to these cities because of the markets getting more competitive. Some of the key healthcare groups have been using telemedicine to increase their reach in these cities. The focus by healthcare providers to cater to tier II and III cities’ patients will help increasing IT penetration in these cities in the future.
How many EMR vendors are there in India? How have the EMR standards here helped?
The market has over 120 vendors with small to large scale offerings with variety of web based and client side products. There are approximately 35 domestic EMR vendors in India with multiple product portfolios. Creation of awareness, imparting training and proving ROIs are the important aspects that can be practiced more by the vendors. Consolidations (partnerships, M&As etc.) are few other trends which help in standardisation of solutions and provides greater geographic coverage.
What is being done for training and education in the field of EMR in India? What are the areas of improvement?
Till date the training and education part is either handled by the healthcare groups or by the vendors supplying EMR that is specific for their clients. No public body for healthcare IT training is in place. To train the staff, government should arrange training programmes or courses to enhance their computer skills, and a step towards that can be via partnerships with the private sector for conducting such training.