Technology helped this doctor and his team treat 20,000 Covid-19 patients

Dr Atul Vadgaonkar used EMR software from HealthPlix, a leading player in this space, to manage patient records and streamline the consultation process and data analytics

Tucked away in a lane on Gangapur Road in Nashik, an ancient holy city in Maharashtra, is Vijay Nursing Home. The parking area there has been converted into an open-space facility with a tent to treat Covid-19 patients. This helps to maintain adequate airflow and ensures limited spread of infection at the facility.

Dr Atul Vadgaonkar, who runs the healthcare centre, and his team of doctors divide their time in various shifts to treat patients. The burden of Covid-19 on health systems and healthcare workers is substantial in India. This includes the personal risk of infection, fear of transmission to family members and exhaustion.

Amid all these adversities, Vadgaonkar said he was able to successfully run his Covid war room with his team of 10 doctors for the last one-and-a-half years and treat about 20,000 Covid patients. During this period, Vadgaonkar said none of the doctors was infected by the virus and they have been able to maintain a patient recovery ratio of 90-98 per cent. The clinic delivered patient outcomes entirely through OPD (outpatient department) services.

“We see almost 600-700 patients per day,” says Vadgaonkar.  

How tech came into play

The adoption of technology has played a key role for Vadgaonkar and his small team of doctors to treat patients on such a large scale. This was made possible through the support provided by Bengaluru-based HealthPlix, a leading provider of electronic medical records (EMR) technology in the country. This includes utilising the HealthPlix EMR solution to manage patient records and streamline the consultation process and data analytics. 

“Our main aim of the treatment is to (prevent) a patient getting (admitted) in the hospital,” says Vadgaonkar. He says many of his patients got cured at home. He said the whole initiative of the organisation is a philanthropic activity and the patients are charged a minimum amount compared to large hospitals, where bills run in lakhs of rupees.

"Due to the pandemic, people (already) didn't have spare money," says Vadgaonkar. "And now, because of this disease, they have to shell out a lot of money. So they have to sell their land and houses for that. We have seen many members suffering in the same family."

The adoption of electronic medical records (EMR) systems helped Vadgaonkar digitise administrative tasks and the storage of clinical records seamlessly. The healthcare IT platforms streamlined communication between various points of the healthcare ecosystem and made it easy for his team to track patients’ medical histories. A doctor only has a few minutes to spend on a patient, remember the past diagnosis by glancing at their record and formulate a plan of management.

HealthPlix helped doctors serve patients more efficiently with the limited time they have during the current pandemic. “While a normal practitioner can handle 100-150 patients maximum in a window of 8 hours, a fully functional EMR can literally double those numbers if used effectively,” says Vadgaonkar. 

He and his team look at the data from patients regularly and continuously update themselves based on the data that flows in via patient records. In a wartime situation like Covid, having reliable data on treatment records is difficult. However, an already acquainted EMR system is helping Vadgaonkar and his team.

Vadgaonkar also implemented other innovative practices which immensely helped to treat the patients. This included having separate X-ray facilities for Covid patients. These helped control the spread to non-Covid patients. 

Experts say that triaging Covid suspect patients using X-ray is fast, cost-effective and efficient. It can be a very useful tool especially in smaller towns in the country owing to the lack of easy access to CT (computed tomography) scans. This will also reduce the existing burden on radiologists and make CT machines which are being used for Covid be used for other diseases and illnesses owing to overload for CT scans.

To identify Covid patients easily, Vadgaonkar also provided them with a waterproof wristband to wear until they tested negative. Apart from these, Vadgaonkar also efficiently managed the supply of oximeters and oxygen, by working in sync with the patients and local authorities. This included the reuse of the oximeters after sanitisation deposited by the recovered patients.

HealthPlix, which began its operations in 2016, is playing an important role to help address the Covid-19 pandemic. HealthPlix CEO and co-founder Sandeep Gudibanda, said doctors on the frontline may not be able to keep records of all patients, but an EMR system does it effortlessly.

“This is helping doctors to just focus on patients and save their time otherwise spent on mundane tasks,” said Gudibanda. Becoming digital also enhances protection against Covid. People are not exchanging physical documents that can lead to infection transmission. “We are delighted to see Dr. Atul Vadgaonkar making data-backed decisions through HealthPlix Platform.”

Through its assistive-AI powered EMR software, HealthPlix empowers doctors to drive better health outcomes for their patients by providing clinical decision support at the point of care. About 12 million patients across India have been treated through the HealthPlix EMR platform by doctors practising across 16 specialities. HealthPlix’s doctor base and geographic spread across over 250 cities in India, makes it one of the largest EMR software used by doctors to digitize the care in Indian healthcare. 

HealthPlix, which is backed by investors such as Lightspeed and JSW  is now increasing its efforts to help doctors provide in-person or remote consultation to their patients using the same digital platform seamlessly. “Our goal is to grow 5x by expanding the doctor base in existing geographies, adding new towns and medical specialities, and strengthening our team and product,” said Gudibanda.

India could see a staggering one million deaths from Covid-19 by August 1, according to an editorial in the British medical journal Lancet. There have been at least 25,228,996 confirmed cases of coronavirus in India and about 278,719 people have died. Experts say that the actual death count far exceeds the official figure. With over 400,000 cases of Covid-19 every day, India is in dire need of viable technology solutions like HealthPlix.

Globally, there is a huge demand for such platforms especially after the outbreak of the pandemic. Innovaccer Inc., a healthcare technology company recently closed a round of growth funding at a $1.3 billion post-money valuation, led by Tiger Global Management. San Francisco-based Innovaccer which has offices in India was planning to launch the Innovaccer Health Cloud. The platform-as-a-service offering combines the company’s data activation platform and application suite with an extensive set of platform services and tools. These allow customers and partners to develop interoperable applications that improve patient engagement and operational performance.