Don’t fret if your general physician goes for a summer vacation and you happen to need any medical services. Just pick up the phone and dial a doctor. You would be connected to a contact centre where you are required to pay the minimum consultation fees of Rs 160 using your credit card. Once done, you would be put through to a doctor in a matter of minutes.
So, what’s new, you would wonder. This option of paying over the phone for medical services will be available to the 400 million telecom subscribers and over 40 million landline subscribers across operators in India, as against the 45 million internet connected individuals. For the first time, phone-based interactive voice response (IVR) technology and not the internet is being used by HealthcareMagic, a Bangalore — based company. The company through its website, www.HealthcareMagic.com, provides healthcare services across the country over internet and now through phone too.
Targeted at metros and tier-1 cities, IVR service is already drawing on an average 350-500 calls a day, claims HealthcareMagic’s Vice-President (Marketing & Business Development), Dr Abhilash Thirupathy. The health care industry, a well-known laggard in information technology, can learn a few lessons from this innovative phone-based medical service. A team of more than 35 doctors work at the back-end to provide users medical services between 9 am to 9 pm, with an aim to service patients 24x7 in near future. “We have based our service offering like an outsourcing hub, complete with an automated voice service tool and 24x7 patient support,” says Dr Thirupathy.
Patients have to use their voices to navigate through HealthcareMagic’s billings system and eventually pay for services. Earlier, HealthcareMagic had launched a ‘Doctor on Call’ service with Loop Mobile (then BPL Mobile) for its Mumbai subscribers, who could access medical assistance over phone at just Rs 15 per minute.
Not limiting HealthcareMagic’s services to just credit card owners, Atom Technologies, which has developed the IVR payment system is working on integrating debit cards, internet banking accounts and also cash cards. Dewang Neralla, director, Atom Technologies, is hopeful of drawing in more users as the payment options grow, “We earn more than Rs 250 crore in revenues through IVR-based payment tools, and the healthcare industry has just woken up to it.” He expects M-Commerce to grow to Rs 10,000 crore by 2013 and healthcare industry contributing up to 2-5 per cent to the market.
