Corporate Hospitals are not a solution for India

Another day arrives. Another day tells us 36000 people have acquired the virus. Later today, many friends would pour their woes onto Social Media as to how some Corporate Hospitals have fleeced them.

Others would write in as to how some hospitals are like dead dungeons with no patients and all the doctors sitting there looking like hungry panthers waiting for prey.

Some will also write personal experiences. I could also. Having been through a recent episode at a leading corporate hospital in Hyderabad that was about to move me in for surgery for Sciatica or hernia or both!

And they charged me Rs. 43000 for tests and medicines and little else.

And then my old physiotherapist, who lives two floors above me in the same building in Whitefield (Bangalore) where I go for a four day visit, sees my condition and announces that I have something called ITB Syndrome. She gives me eleven exercises and am back on my feet in three days flat.

Wow!

Those were doctors in that hospital who thousands of patients would blindly believe. And they were about to do an operation that wasn’t needed at all. And charge a bomb!

But let me not get negative and despondent here.

There’s a reason they do that. Because they have been told to do that. Because they have targets. Because their survival as a consultant, specialist or a doctor in house happens only when they get revenues through patients.

And why do hospitals need revenues?

Simple, the land that they stand on and the building that they are in have to be paid for. Rent or lease, the cost is already omnipresent and then there are those banks and institutions those who have funded them, who need their pound of flesh too.

Do the math. They need the money for all that and those salaries and revenue shares with doctors that they have to do. Then, they have those third party agencies for nursing, diagnostics, housekeeping, security and maintenance where the costs keep mounting.

Viola! who pays?

Right, you - the patient!

So, what’s the alternative.

How can India have home care elevated to the next level.

The doctor can either come home (which was anyway the case earlier, remember those doctors with cases walking in to see a patient in Hindi films) or be on a video call with patients and with the help of some apps, check on the basic parameters of patients to give care. Probably, 80% of cases in India can be easily taken care of like this.

Then next step, is arming government hospitals. Easier said than done. But the time has come when government hospitals have to be modernised. Enough of those stadiums and hotels being converted into emergency wards. If the government has to make a budget for this, so be it. Hard tasks need hard decisions, especially financial ones. But no crowding here, the initial screening shall be done from homes via telephone or video calls. Only when, doctors deem it necessary for the patient to come over to these hospitals, they will. And a bank of data shall be maintained against the Aadhaar Card of each patient so that healthcare is common and delivery is perfect. All check ups also will contribute to this data and over time a history of each patient shall emerge including family history.

Easier said than done.

So, an alternative also needs to be worked on where homecare extends to pre-surgery and post-surgery care too. The beds in these government hospitals can then be used for only emergencies and nurses or doctors will not be overloaded.

Home care will have to extend to DIY for the home members who will see and understand instructions through videos and do it correctly for the patient involved.

This is an easier goal and open source technology can be harvested, startups could be incubated in labs and technology institutions to make this happen fast and good.

But the start needs to be made as the Corporate Hospitals will not lead this country’s growth towards healthcare for all by any given chance.