Health Domain Issues and Open Opportunities in India

I’m a part of Reliance Jio Health team and since last few months I’m working on health system in India. I’m sharing my experiences related to health domain issues in India and open opportunities.

At present, we are the second largest country in the world from the population perspective. As per the mid year 2020 health care survey, India is at 42nd rank from the health care index perspective. Being a large country and having diverse culture, we have 22 different languages in India. Most of the states in India are having their own primary languages to book the official records. So, there are many issues that can be taken care of from the health perspective in India.

Health Domain Issues in India

Different Languages: As mentioned earlier, there are around 22 different official languages in India. If we talk about the local small clinics and hospitals in every state of India, they prefer regional languages to maintain health records. So it seems that we have huge number of such small ecosystems which are maintaining health records in different languages.

Population and Literacy in India: India’s total population is around 1.3 billion as per 2020 report and India is having literacy rate of 77.7% as per 2020 literacy report. So being a big democratic country and having a low literacy rate, it’s very difficult to get the right measure of every person’s health.

Different Pharmacy Treatments and Standards: India is having different health treatment systems like Homeopathy, Ayurveda and Allopathy, and every health treatment system is diversified within itself. As mentioned earlier, India has diversified culture, so same homeopathic treatment can be recorded in many different languages. There is no central health system for a specific treatment system.

No Central Governance on Health Data: As being so diverse in culture and languages, we have very diversified health system in India. Literacy rate is also not impressive in India, we have 308.9 million illiterate people so definitely thats a huge number and there are high chances that their health data in not recorded properly. So not having a central governance of health data is a major issue. To create such central health governance system, we need to have some sort of unique health id for all the people in India. Indian government is working in that direction to have a unique health id for every Indian.

Opportunities in Health Domain in India

Large User Base for Research and Development: As being the second largest country in the world from the population perspective, we are the second largest user base in the world. The same is true from the consumer perspective also. India has huge opportunities grounds from various perspectives such as:

1. The largest consumers from medicine and pharmaceutical needs. So medicine, pharmaceutical items and health equipment manufacturers have huge opportunities to grow.
2. Research & Laboratories have huge opportunities to run their research.
3. Programs on larger set of patients.

Opportunity Around the Central Health System: According to media reports, the Indian government has already initiated a talk to provide unique health id for every Indian citizen. So this is an extremely great opportunity for the health domain specific companies/organisations to build their products or programs for customer/patient specific. Health device manufacturers can use build/tune/track their health devices for patient specific.

Opportunities Around the Health Data: 1.3 billion user’s health data will be enormous. This health data will be vast and very precious to run many activities such as:

1. Health data will be utilised for research and development from the research & laboratories perspective.
2. Government may create policies for benefit of the people, states, organisation and the institutions. Government may create the policies to balance doctor-population ratio. Doctor-patient ratio in India is lesser than WHO-prescribed norm of 1:1000. The doctor-population ratio in India is 1:1456 against the WHO recommendation of 1:1000.

Opportunities to Make People Life Better: We have the opportunities to make people lives better. People can be treated in a better way. Their health records can be maintained in a better way and will be easily accessible. We can avoid different language barrier and can provide equal opportunities to each Indian to receive better health treatment and live a healthy life.

References:

1. https://www.numbeo.com/health-care/rankings_by_country.jsp
2. https://www.worldometers.info/world-population/india-population/#:~:text=The%20current%20population%20of%20India,of%20the%20total%20world%20population.
3. https://www.hindustantimes.com/education/international-literacy-day-2020-kerala-most-literate-state-in-india-check-rank-wise-list/story-IodNVGgy5hc7PjEXUBKnIO.html#:~:text=International%20Literacy%20Day%202020%3A%20The,recorded%20the%20lowest%20literacy%20rate.
4. https://www.dnaindia.com/india/report-national-digital-health-mission-every-indian-to-get-a-unique-health-id-here-s-how-it-will-work-2837782#:~:text=It%20is%20the%20National%20Digital,%2C%22%20the%20Prime%20Minister%20said.&text=PM%20Modi%20said%20that%20under,information%20related%20to%20their%20health.
5. https://health.economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/industry/doctor-patient-ratio-in-india-less-than-who-prescribed-norm-of-11000-govt/72135237
6. https://www.deccanherald.com/business/budget-2020/the-doctor-population-ratio-in-india-is-11456-against-who-recommendation-800034.html