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Accessible and affordable equipments will drive the growth of medical electronics in India

The need for basic healthcare is quickly becoming a challenge for developing countries. This creates enormous opportunities in the manufacturing of medical electronics

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Soma Tah
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BANGALORE, INDIA:  According to a PwC report, the Indian healthcare industry is growing at a CAGR of 15% and is expected to touch US$ 250 billion by 2020. Some of the driving growth factors are rising population, increasing lifestyle related health issues, thrust in medical tourism due to cheaper treatment costs, and various government initiatives.

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Lifestyle diseases largely demand secondary and tertiary treatment, which in turn drives the medical equipment market. India needs special medical equipment to suit the environment, which is beset with a large rural population and infrastructure shortages, limiting access to healthcare. Equipment that will allow for telemedicine, remote diagnosis and low-cost treatments is the need of the hour.

''IT will be the matrix on which healthcare will be delivered,'' said Dr. Devi Prasad Shetty, Chairman, Narayana Health during an ESDM track session around medical electronics hosted by IESA at CeBIT India 2014.  "India needs 1 million doctors, 2 million nurses and 3 billion beds and in 10 years, 75% of hospital beds will be in the ICU.'' Technology can help in re-defining the healthcare delivery. He pointed out that, technology will not replace doctors; it will only make them efficient.

Mohammed Hussain Naseem, Founder & CEO, 2mpower Health Management Services (P) Ltd. said that wearables can transform healthcare to be meaningful, affordable and accessible. It will solve all the complex problems we are facing in the healthcare today. For example, 50% of the heart attacks happen in the morning, he said and by monitoring the heart rates through censors, a lot of lives can be saved.

“The need for basic healthcare is quickly becoming a challenge for developing countries. This creates enormous opportunities in the manufacturing of medical electronics. But as medical designs continue to shrink in size, the design challenges and limitations within medical electronics become more pronounced. 90 per cent of patient cases in India do not require a doctor to be physically present. Local manufacturers who understand the unique dynamics of the Indian healthcare industry are best suited to innovate and develop medical equipment that suit the requirements of developing nations like ours,” said  M.N. Vidyashankar, President, IESA.

“The need for high precision technology is yet another major hindrance for domestic manufacturing of medical electronic equipment. Such precision in medical electronics, however, cannot be achieved in isolation from other technologies like nanotechnology, materials, power sources, sensors and micro-fluidics. However, a price sensitive Indian market coupled with the lack of regulation is driving large scale imports of medical equipment. This has a huge impact on the growth of the domestic manufacturing sector,” said he.

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