Chandigarh: How PGI’s telemedicine dept is saving time, money while expanding healthcare facilities

According to Dr Amit Aggarwal, project lead, Regional Resource Centre, Department of Telemedicine, the institute is guided by a “hub and spoke” model, where the primary health care and community health care centres (the spoke) seek consultation from PGIMER, a tertiary care centre. “The health care worker is the first contact of the patients and from there they are referred to a doctor here at PGIMER,” explains Aggarwal. While PGIMER is an implementing agency of telemedicine services for several states, it is the Haryana government that adopted the institute’s proposal for hiring manpower for telemedicine services and the department established a speciality and super-speciality hub in 2021 to give medical consultations to the state, and the hub has provided more than one lakh consultations for Haryana.

“The Haryana government is very proactive and open to our proposals. A cost-effective and per-pocket saving analysis we did, showed that on average one patient saved about 400 km of travel for speciality services and seven to twelve kms for general services from nearby areas like Panchkula. This means not only saving of both time and money for patients, but also saving them travel from faraway villages in tough weather conditions, with many patients from Nuh, Jind, Rohtak etc using these services and getting access to the best healthcare,” adds Aggarwal.

Gynaecology and paediatrics are the two fields, where patients seek maximum consultation, with one consultant listening to an average of about 7 to 12 calls, with one call of about 7 to 12 minutes, and services offered from 9 am to 4 pm.

Through the e-Sanjeevi portal, healthcare workers in the health and wellness centres in every district, consult specialists in the institute via video conferencing. “In emergency cases, like high BP in pregnant women, anaemia, we immediately ask the patient to come to PGIMER. Nine doctors offer teleconsultation from the fields of paediatrics, gynaecology, internal medicine, ophthalmology, and dermatology, with video consultation enabling specialists to look at enlarged images and offer consultation. Many patients do not have to travel for a follow-up, to change medicine, or to show a test report, and this is the future.

In a study done by the National Health Authority, the government on average is saving Rs 972 per patient due to telemedicine, and we hope in the coming years, telemedicine can be used in OPDs of the institute,” sums up Saikia.