Indian Express
09 May 2010
New Delhi, India

Apollo Hospitals, Asia’s largest health care provider and Cisco, announced an alliance to help revolutionise health care through information and communication technology (ICT).

The joint initiative will help drive inclusive growth and well being by accelerating access to affordable and high quality health care via Cisco’s desktop based HealthPresence Extended Reach technology.

Speaking about the association, Sangita Reddy, executive director–Apollo Hospitals Group, said: “At Apollo Hospitals, we constantly endeavor to introduce new models to help in making quality health care accessible to the masses. The alliance with Cisco will revolutionize the delivery of health care in India. Cisco’s desktop based HealthPresence Extended Reach technology represents significant advances in technology and telecommunication techniques, effectively delivering health care 24x7 remotely.”This alliance will be executed over three phases with:

The deployment of Phase I being announced today where Apollo would leverage ICT to transform its operations

Phase II consisting of Cisco and Apollo undertaking joint thought leadership activities and developing open healthcare IT industry standards

Phase III will involve Apollo and Cisco leveraging these ICT solutions to transform healthcare in India, APAC, and emerging countries.

Commenting on this relationship, Wim Elfrink, chief globalisation officer and executive vice president, Cisco Services, said, “Collaborative technologies, powered by ubiquitous broadband access, will enable access to affordable and high–quality health care services in rural and urban communities. We believe communities, cities, countries and individual lives can be transformed by providing access to socially, economically and environmentally sustainable solutions.”

Healthcare providers face many challenges in the delivery of health care services particularly to suburban and rural areas in India.

During the last decade Apollo Telemedicine Networking Foundation, the largest and oldest multi specialty telemedicine network has met some of these issues in an organized and cost efficient manner. The integration of Cisco’s desktop based Health Presence Extended Reach technology with Apollo Hospital’s “Medintegra”will now for the first time make available a user friendly, cost effective tele–medicine solution, at a significantly reduced initial investment at the remote end. As part of this initiative, Cisco and Apollo have collaborated in Raichur (Karnataka, South India) to demonstrate how health care in rural areas can be transformed.