Towards the beginning of next year, the ColumbiaAsia chain of hospitals will announce the launch of a new model of healthcare deliv-ery. It’s launching its 11,000 square feet 11-bed clinic at Doddaballapur, near Bangalore.
It’s the third model of the chain. In this case, while the land is just of two acres as in the above said case, the building will cover barely half an acre. For a more effective healthcare delivery, the hospital chain will make use of telemedicine and teleradiology for faster and a more cost-effective treatment. Incidentally, the model will have no ICUs. “The emphasis of the model is on primary healthcare and that makes up about 70 per cent of the healthcare needs. Women give birth, you catch a cold, children may break their bones,” said Rick Evans, co-founder and chairman, ColumbiaAsia.
The cost differential vis-a-vis the hospitals in Bangalore is telling. While the OPD consultation at ColumbiaAsia‘s hospital in Bangalore is Rs 350, at Doddaballapur it could be only Rs 100. An x-ray costs only Rs 200 at the clinic, while it costs Rs 350 at it’s Hebbal hospital. While the clinic may not have all the specialists at hand, it will make use of the expertise of the doctors at it’s Yeswanthpur facility who will remotely study an x-ray or a CT scan in real time to diagnose any issue. “Telemedicine and telepathology increases the clinical abilities of doctors too,” added Evans.
The hospital at Yeswanthpur already has a proven model in doing so. It has been making use of its strength of studying x-rays, CT scans and MRI scans remotely as a revenue model. “There are a couple of diagnostic centres among others who get their medical tests including scans and x-rays read at our Yeswanthpur hospital,” said Dr Nandakumar Jairam, the chairman and medical director of Columbia Asia hospitals in India.
The hospital chain plans to have ambulatory surgery services in Bangalore. Over the past 20-30 years, healthcare delivery has been revolutionised.
“We have definitely changed the design of hos-pitals. People don’t stay in hospitals as they used to in the past,” Evans had told Business Standard earlier. The length of stay is shortening today. It’s the invasive proc-edures that are said to be shortening the hospital stays. “The number of surgeries of a day over the last 15 years has been rising and they are continuing to grow. Hence, you don’t need as many hospitals,” said Evans.