KM Cherian
With the COVID-19 outbreak changing the world's lifestyle, we are progressing towards a “phygital” era, where technology will play a crucial role. In fact, technology is the key to a wide range of industries worldwide sustaining themselves amid the prolonged lockdown necessitated by the Coronavirus pandemic. And the healthcare sector is no different. Given the infectious nature of the virus and the need for social distancing, there has been growing concern about the management of diseases unrelated to COVID-19. Hence, the medical world has turned to telemedicine to reach out to patients.
Telemedicine, also known as remote healthcare and medicinal services, has a wide array of utilisation in various cases and application zones. In the present scenario of the Coronavirus spreading through contact, this technology is a boon. It should be optimally utilised so as to have the option to keep clinical staff, patients, and the bigger open forum from getting contaminated. With many healthcare start-ups burgeoning in the country, telemedicine has an extremely promising future. According to a study by Data Labs, the telemedicine market in India is expected to reach $5.4 billion by 2025 with a Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 31 per cent. In fact, in March, telemedicine guidelines were issued by the Centre, which provided a lot of clarity and set the standards for telemedicine in India.
In the context of the Coronavirus, the term “flatten the curve” has been making the rounds. What it essentially means is to curb the disease as much as possible so as to avoid putting a strain on hospital services as the number of beds in the country is not enough. The health emergency caused by the Coronavirus led to a state of alarm in the country and consequently, substantial changes were needed to reorganise Indian healthcare services, particularly for patients suffering from heart disease. Hence, it was thought prudent to use that branch of telemedicine which is especially meant to meet the needs of cardiac patients: Telecardiology.
In order to ensure continuity of quality healthcare for patients with heart disease, it is important to differentiate between deferrable and non-deferrable activity with specific objectives. At most hospitals in the country, this has meant that most scheduled activities were postponed. In such a scenario, even though in its nascent stages, telecardiology has played a crucial rule. While it ensures that patients with cardiac diseases get the treatment and diagnosis they need, it additionally adds to keeping clinic limits and avoiding unnecessary visits.Telecardiology aims to monitor patients in real time for irregularities and offer remote diagnosis. This technology will be useful for treatment of heart diseases such as congestive heart failure, cardiac arrest and arrhythmia. It guarantees continuity of care and also raises a red flag for alarming patterns in vitals such as blood pressure, oxygen levels or heart beat per minute.
Telecardiology also removes the barriers of transportation and requirement of physical presence to submit initial data/details. Often unavailability of doctors for consultation tends to create anxiety in patients with heart disease as they need to be able to consult with a doctor immediately in case of an emergency. With telecardiology, doctors are just a click away and available for advice 24×7.
However, telecardiology is not new in India as some hospitals began using it as early as 2005 in order to connect with patients in villages where expert opinion is not available. In fact, late President APJ Abdul Kalam inaugurated a cardiac teleconsultation facility started by Frontier Lifeline Hospital between Chennai, Parumala (Kerala), Tirupati (Andhra Pradesh) and Puducherry in 2005. Since then, it has been helping many patients with complex cardiac problems. It is common knowledge that people with heart ailments and conditions fall under the high-risk category. A heart-related ailment or condition is a co-morbid condition and according to reports, most of the deaths that occurred in COVID-19 infected individuals were of those patients who were suffering from co-morbidities. Therefore, tools that support virtual care and diagnosis can be fruitful for patients with heart disease. They also help doctors to perform better. The integration of existing telemedicine with more advance technologies such as Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning and Virtual Reality, will be a boon. Robots, too, would be able to operate on patients with doctors sitting at remote locations. In fact, an open heart surgery was performed in Leipzig, Germany with the surgeon sitting in San Francisco. There is a famous proverb: “Necessity is the mother of all inventions.” While the pandemic has led to a lot of disruptions across the globe, it has also resulted in the best of technological inventions for the advancement of medical science.
(The writer is a Padma Sri awardee and cardiothoracic surgeon credited with India's first bypass. He is Chairman and CEO of Frontier Lifeline Hospital)
