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Healthcare IT

India’s first virtual ICU to be launched within a year

By Anshupriya Jha | 30 June 2011

In a revolutionary step in telemedicine, Philips Electronics India is planning to set up India’s first virtual Intensive Care Unit (ICU) soon. It will be a relief for critical patients admitted to ICUs in small towns and villages as they would be able to solicit medical advice from specialists based out of metro cities.

According to the Philips India website, the eICU Program clinically transforms the ICU, using a proactive care model that provides a solution to growing physician and nurse shortages while dramatically improving quality of care. Through an ideal blend of medicine with technology, this care model leverages clinical expertise, patented processes, and cutting-edge technologies to improve critical care delivery.

The company plans to launch the programme within a year in India. It is in talks with major tertiary-care hospitals across the country for the same.

The technology will connect ICUs in various hospitals to a specialist ICU in a major hospital where specialist medical professionals monitor the condition of the patient using his/her live image as well as online data collected from the patient’s monitor. The system would alert the specialist in the virtual ICU at the slightest variation in the patient’s condition.

One specialist can thus be connected to various ICUs at one time and can give life-saving inputs, thereby multiplying the chances of recovery of the patient. It would help the healthcare sector overall as it would deal with the perennial shortage of qualified doctors.

Each eICU will cost a minimum of Rs. 2 crore with the cost increasing in direct proportion to the increase in number of ICUs to be connected.

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