NEW DELHI: Philips Healthcare is aiming to provide electronic intensive care units (eICU) services in up to 30,000 beds in hospitals of tier II and III cities in the next five years as part of its expansion plans.
An eICU is a form of telemedicine that utilizes state of the art technology to provide an additional layer of critical care service. An eICU support centre can provide care to patients in multiple hospitals.
For the last one year, Philips Healthcare, a division of Philips India, has been providing eICU services to 250 hospital beds in small cities. The company has set up four support/ command centers in hospitals – FMRI in Gurgaon, Apollo in Hyderabad, Medica Superspecialty Hospital in Kolkata and INTeleICU in Chennai.
“India has around 2,00,000 ICU beds. Potential for is for 300,000 ICU beds in the next five years. We should be able to do between 7 to 10 per cent of the total ICU beds in next five years,” Philips South Asia President – Healthcare Sameer Garde told PTI.
To support the expansion of eICUs, the company would add additional up to six support centers in next two years, he said.
Talking about the opportunities in this area, Garde said the country has 2,00,000 ICU beds but qualified intensivists to manage the facility are only 500.
“The ratio is almost above 1:400. The facility is better in metro places,” he said, adding that the company would go to tier II and III cities besides focusing on large hospitals in metros.
Sharing details on how eICU functions, Garde said, “At the support centre, patients are monitored 24X7 through cameras and monitor all the vital information. If vital condition of patients are changing, then the support centre informs the general medicine person out there. This saves costs for the patients and get best care.”
eICU facilities are provided only after training nurses and technicians, he said, and added that such services are provided on revenue share basis.
The official said that Philips Healthcare would adopt different strategy for different markets.
“We would continue to focus on large hospitals in the metro but we would also go to tier II & III places,” he said.
Philips Healthcare is building relationship with tier 2 hospitals to widen portfolio.
The company is also planning to provide strategic advisory services to existing hospitals in metros to modernize their facilities in the next five years, he added.
“There are certain hospitals which have not upgraded quickly… We are helping them to make their strategies for IT system to patient flow, design etc in the next five years,” Garde said. -PTI
