Apollo proposes telemedicine venture for Rajasthan

Thursday, 21 October 2004, 19:30 IST
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JAIPUR: If all goes well, no village in Rajasthan will lack medical care at its doorstep. A leading healthcare provider has proposed a telemedicine project for India's largest state where distances often come in the way of providing even basic medical services. "The proposal is aimed at providing quality healthcare, and even super speciality care through multi-functional V-SAT enabled mobile hospital units (MVMHUs) in isolated areas of the state," a state government official said of the project mooted by the Apollo Telemedicine Networking Foundation. The company has already made a presentation to Rajasthan Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje. It has proposed that each district in the state have one V-SAT based mobile healthcare unit and an ambulance. A MVMHU is a self-contained mobile platform housing medical and diagnostic facilities, a sophisticated satellite communication link and a captive power unit. It would be capable of setting up a mobile hospital at any village, within a few hours, to provide preventive as well as curative healthcare. The ambulance will supplement the efforts of the MVMHUs, the company said. Its final goal is to have two MVMHUs and two ambulances in every district. Initially, seven districts - Jaipur, Kota, Jhalawar, Udaipur, Bikaner, Jodhpur and Ajmer - will each be covered with one MVMHU and an ambulance. The two vehicles will be based out of their respective district hospitals and travel to different villages.
Source: IANS