Augustine Amusu, Chief Information Officer at Mediclinic Middle East, hits the nail on the head when he says there\u2019s nothing like a crisis to concentrate the minds. Although the tech and regulatory approvals for telemedicine were in place, it wasn\u2019t a priority for most of the private hospitals until the onset of the coronavirus pandemic. American Hospital Dubai was the only one that had a teleconsultation service, which was launched in January. But when Covid-19 forced the industry to move to a physically distanced, contactless world, others were quick to act.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThe Covid-19 situation provided the impetus for many healthcare organisations to accelerate their approach to telehealth,\u201d says Amusu. Within a short period, new technology was deployed, plug-in solutions were implemented or old was tweaked and innovated upon to help health providers extend their care right into people\u2019s homes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cA number of measures were adopted such as upgrading our network bandwidth to cater for additional demand; configuration of our Electronic Medical Record Systems to accommodate new pathways, billing codes and clinical documentation; procuring high-definition cameras and headsets where required in order to provide the best service possible \u2013 new solutions need to fit into an evolving systems architecture and this had to be reviewed,\u201d explains Amusu.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
While Mediclinic Middle East opted for Health at Hand, a digital teleconsultation platform, Aster DM Healthcare used its technology landscape and innovated to provide telemedicine. \u201cTime was of essence in this case and we knew that there is no one-size-fits-all solution,\u201d says Veneeth Purushotaman, Group Chief Information Officer at Aster DM Healthcare. \u201cThe technology landscape at Aster DM Healthcare included the entire Microsoft Office 365 stack and we were already using the O365 cloud along with Teams for our collaboration needs within the organisation. The hospitals have a Hospital Information System (HIS) hosted on Azure and the clinics have another HIS being deployed on Alibaba Cloud.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWe offered teleconsultation by building a solution using Microsoft Teams platform, which enables HIPAA, GDPR and SOC compliance, interfaced the HIS using their API to allow the patient to book a slot, complete the consultation online, make a co-payment where applicable and even have their medicines delivered home. At our Medcare hospitals and clinics we implemented a Cisco-based platform to carry out teleconsultation.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Zulekha Hospital was one of the early movers in the field and had obtained the approvals for launching telemedicine before the pandemic. So it was able to launch the service at the beginning of the lockdown itself. \u201cPeople can book telephonic or video appointments using any of the eight communication channels including the call centre, website, app, WhatsApp for Business platform, WhatsApp via the website and social media pages, web chat and Facebook messenger,\u201d says Aliasgar Bohari, IT Director at Zulekha Hospital.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
For Cleveland Clinic Abu Dhabi, its new platform for virtual visits has enabled thousands of patients to consult their doctor on a smartphone or mobile device. \u201cWe are increasingly able to monitor a patient\u2019s health beyond the walls of the hospital, such as with our remote heart monitoring programme that allows patients to return to their lives and be observed for changes in their condition,\u201d adds CEO Dr Rakesh Suri.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Remote monitoring and provision of continuous remote care, or telehealth, are the next steps in the progression for telemedicine. American Hospital Dubai too considers telemedicine as the foundation for future remote monitoring of patients.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
However for now, UAE hospitals are working hard to stay on top of things while new questions about telemedicine crop up. \u201cDelivering telemedicine requires cross-functional teams of colleagues to meet regularly, review and advance to the next steps while communicating with all stakeholders,\u201d explains Amusu. \u201cAs we deploy there remains an open question: do our customers prefer an on-demand or a scheduled teleconsultation service \u2013 we actively support both models, however we are always willing to learn and adapt to our patients\u2019 preferences.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And for telemedicine to continue smoothly in this market, it needs support from another quarter: the insurance sector. \u201cThe only potential roadblock is the lack of clarity and buy-in from insurance payors on teleconsultation and that is something which needs to be addressed and resolved,\u201d says Purushotaman.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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