Hospitals step up virtual game for young parents amid the pandemic

Virtual emergency rooms, smart wearables to track foetal heart rate and temperature are some of the new initiatives in the space

For working couple the Sinhas (name changed), the night of June 23 brought panic along with it. Their three-month-old son suddenly got high fever after dinner and the parents immediately wanted to consult a doctor as they did not know what to do in such a situation. Because of the Covid fear around, they did not want to go to a hospital either. As the son had been delivered at the Motherhood Hospital in Bengaluru, they contacted the customer care service of the Bengaluru branch, which directed them to the virtual emergency room where a consultation was done at around 1 a.m. with the paediatrician coming to a conclusion that the baby only had viral fever because of a change in the weather. Medicines were prescribed on the virtual portal and the issue was resolved remotely within minutes.

Private equity fund TPG-backed women and child hospital chain, Motherhood Hospital, is engaging with patients on the virtual format to reduce the risk of spread of Covid-19. In fact, about 15 days before the start of the lockdown, the hospital chain had begun preparing at the backend to build a virtual set-up for patient consultation. 

The hospital chain had brought on board start-up Docpulse to set up virtual consultations, virtual ERs (emergency rooms) and give antenatal sessions to expecting mothers. Today, over 18,000 people have consulted with paediatricians and gynaecologists at the 12 Motherhood hospital branches across five states, through the virtual mode. This virtual footfall consists of a major cluster of patients from tier-II and tier-III cities, says the hospital chain.

The virtual ERs have been set up for anxious parents who seek timely medical consultation for their kids. The idea behind this initiative is not final treatment but to reassure parents via a 24/7 video consultation support. The service caters to all kinds of pediatric diagnoses, treatment and consultations to prevent rushing to the hospital due to fear of infection.

“Technology has enabled the primary level of healthcare which is consultation. Next, we would like to get into the secondary level of treatment via innovations,” says Vijayarathna Venkatraman, CEO at Motherhood Hospitals.

Going forward, the hospital wants to extent the technology to provide personalised services under which expectant mothers would be able to track foetal heart rate, doctors will be able monitor respiratory rates and access temperature of children via gadgets and wearables.

“We are engaging with a couple of players on foetal heart rate monitoring and wearables space to monitor children's health,” added Venkatraman.

Another hospital chain, Rainbow Hospital, is also taking antenatal sessions virtually aimed at the physical well-being of pregnant women who are the most vulnerable to the virus. The team at Rainbow Hospital has also come up with a slew of initiatives like home vaccination for children and home monitoring packages for those who have tested positive involving remote monitoring, regular health updates and processes for quick interventions. 

“We are looking at implementing a full-fledged CRM Solution, further aided by AI- and ML-driven applications, that allows for seamless integration among the various back-end functions and efficient data crunching leading to a smoother and unified experience for the consumer,” said Harmandeep Singh, Group Head – IT, Rainbow Children’s Hospital.

Cloudnine Group of Hospitals which has around 17 hospitals and clinics under the chain has also been doing teleconsultation in these testing times along with services such as home vaccination and sample collection at home. The chain’s “It’s Our Baby” app is the interface on which consultations can be done remotely.