Need To Create An Infra Layer In The Health-tech Industry: Gaurav Gupta

What are the current trends that are shaping the health-tech space in India?

The advent of healthcare technologies such as telemedicine, medical wearables, digital prescriptions, electronic health records, online pharmacies, e-diagnostics, fintech for health (digital lending in healthcare), home healthcare services, and digital therapeutics is transforming the landscape of the Indian healthcare system. India finds itself at the cusp of a digital healthcare revolution. By harnessing the power of digital technologies, the country is targeting to achieve universal health coverage. The digital healthcare market in India is expected to reach $130 billion by 2023, advancing at a CAGR of 39 per cent.

Healthtech is on a never-before growth journey. As a consequence of the crippling effects of Covid-19 and the growing need for personalised treatments, access to affordable healthcare services has become the need of the hour. While this has introduced various changes in the healthcare industry, the most prominent one is the integration of technology at every step of patient-doctor interaction.

More and more healthcare organisations are gravitating toward technological trends to abreast in the industry. The key drivers of this growth include extensive adoption of digital technologies by doctors and hospitals; higher trust amongst patients & inclination towards technology offering better care and the rise of innovative business models that create a win-win situation for all the stakeholders. 

Do you think teleconsultation is a step toward transforming the healthcare landscape in India?

Teleconsultation has been a significant step toward transforming the healthcare landscape in the country because it taught each and every individual in the country to start using technology for healthcare. Most of us have used teleconsultation for our own selves or for our family members in the last 2 years, which has helped us to start trusting technology for better healthcare. Not only us as patients, but also, our doctors have started using technology and have realised the potential it has in better patient care and better clinic management, along with the higher realisation of profits for their practice.   

Are there any challenges that Health-tech companies are facing at the moment? If yes, how do you think these should be addressed and where should the push come from? 

The health-tech industry is no doubt growing at an exponential rate, with both risks and opportunities offered. Combined with the bank of technology, this can be viewed as a golden age for health-tech companies. Though the industry is flourishing rapidly, there are still a few challenges that cannot be ignored. The industry still faces trust issues, which is one of the most prevalent challenges at the moment.  

Furthermore, there is also a need to create an infra layer in the industry similar to the integration of UPI in Fintech. Besides this, there are a lot of stakeholders in the ecosystem including payers (insurance), providers (hospitals and doctors), patients, fulfilment companies (pharmacies, diagnostics, etc.), and even “fintech for health” companies. Hence, collaboration and integration between these are important for high-quality and cost-effective healthcare delivery. 

What are the different technologies or avenues that are attracting patients to seek care online? 

The Covid-19 pandemic compelled the entire healthcare sector to transition to digital health almost overnight. Countless doctors and patients were scrambling for alternatives to physical appointments and consultations. Additionally, there were grave concerns about the confidentiality of patient records and private information being shared online. Navia’s Connected Care Platform makes quality digital healthcare accessible to all. We provide doctors with robust digital tools to seamlessly automate their practice and increase outreach. As an ABDM compliant platform, we also enable patients to connect remotely with expert doctors and safely share their confidential records. Our platform also facilitates the seamless transfer of information across the healthcare ecosystem. 

Along with this, patients face a lot of problems with respect to the affordability of the care treatments, and platforms that enable digital lending to the patients to reduce the cost burden on the patients and their families. Furthermore, our platform Aarogya Pay is built to provide digital lending to patients.  

How do you think Navia Life Care is different from other health-tech companies and what are the future plans of the company?

Navia has been one of the most trusted healthtech companies in India. Trust, for a doctor or a patient, is one of the most important factors when they adopt a digital health platform. With our focus on improving patient health outcomes using technology, we have built India’s fastest e-prescription platform.  

For decades, the valuable patient data is stored in paper files, and each time a doctor mines through a plethora of files to access the patient’s health record, thereby losing crucial time. Digitisation enables healthcare to break away from the conventional paper-based medical records and adopt Electronic Medical Record (EMR) systems. Navia Smart EMR provides a smarter way to manage medical records digitally. It enables doctors to access a patient’s health records and manage them digitally in just a few clicks. Besides this, it provides single-click access to a patient’s medical and family history to bring efficiency to medical treatment.

Apart from this, using Navia Smart EMR doctors can create digital prescriptions that can directly be delivered on Whatsapp. The e-Rx can be easily shared with patients in seconds and forwarded to pharmacists which in turn reduces the chances of human error, misinterpretation of hand-writing, and misplacing of the hard copy of prescriptions.

Currently, the Navia Connected Care platform provides AI-based queue management, digital prescriptions generation, electronic medical records, and smart device integration services, along with disease management insights. By leveraging our digital tools and resources, doctors can fully automate their clinic practice and improve the quality of care. Our visions for the coming years are to onboard over 250 thousand doctors and facilitate 200 million+ patients in over 10 countries through our digital platform. 

Besides this, we at Navia are also working towards building the largest healthcare transaction platform which has the potential to reach a transaction value of $2 Billion USD in a couple of years.