To cash in on the healthcare service opportunities in diabetes management across the country, Apollo Hospitals Enterprise Ltd (AHEL) is planning to set up standalone diabetes clinics under the brand, Sugar Clinic, which is currently housed inside its existing hospitals.
The company is looking to tie up with a foreign partner to offer this service in the country, said a senior official from AHEL.
The Sugar Clinic is a diabetes management programme where a person can enroll to be part of the periodic monitoring including health checkup, and watch and control diabetes. At present, there are around 20 sugar clinics, which are in the premises of the hospitals or clinics of Apollo.
“Things are still on the drawing board and might take a quarter before we decide how to go forward. We are talking to a major player in this regard to see how to get into diabetes management as a programme, across the hospitals, clinics and the standalone clinics,” said a company spokesperson.
The foreign tie-up would be more from the technical knowhow perspective, and the talks are with a firm that already has a diabetes management programme. AHEL is looking to its methods and strategies to utilise this. However, he refused to divulge more on the strategy.
The Sugar Clinics would come up as a separate division, not embedded with the current Apollo Clinics, though the format would be similar. The locations would be across the country where Apollo already has its points of presence. While there are other firms working on the diabetes segment, at least in Tamil Nadu, the company expects its strong patient base and patient connect to support it in winning the market.
Plans are to expand Sugar Clinics, with a target to complete around 100 clinics in the next two years.
According to earlier reports, AHEL has developed technologies, including 24X7 call centre and mobile applications and a personalised webpages to assist patients to manage diabetes. The technologies were developed by Apollo Group subsidiaries — healthcare BPO Apollo Health Street Ltd and healthcare management services firm HealthNet Global.
