AstraZeneca partners with Docon to digitize healthcare clinics across India

New Delhi: AstraZeneca India, a leading science-led biopharmaceutical company, has signed a memorandum of understanding with Docon Technologies, Bengaluru, for digitizing 1,000 clinics across India.

Under the partnership, Docon will equip the identified clinics with customized Electronic Medical Record (EMR) systems enabling clinicians to access complete patient history.  This will go a long way in helping the clinical community better treat chronic patients and manage long-term complications of non-communicable diseases (NCD’s) like diabetes and cardiovascular diseases.

The rising risk of NCD related deaths has necessitated the need for better treatment protocols to reduce mortality rates and hence having a centralised repository of critical patient history becomes important. According to The Indian Health Ministry, 1 in 4 Indians has a risk of dying from an NCD before they reach the age of 70. The major NCDs in India are cardiovascular diseases, cancers, diabetes and chronic respiratory diseases. Physical inactivity, unhealthy diets, tobacco use, and the harmful use of alcohol are the main behavioural risk factors for NCDs. They contribute to raised blood pressure (hypertension); raised blood sugar (diabetes); raised and abnormal blood lipids (dyslipidaemia); and obesity.

In addition to the multiple government initiatives in the country, digitization of small clinics with the support of EMR, teleconsultation and other additional facilities will provide the doctor and the patient a better opportunity to interact and ensure that there is constant monitoring of the patient and medication adherence.

Commenting on the initiative, Mr. Gagandeep Singh, Managing Director, AstraZeneca India said, “As a part of AstraZeneca’s continued vision to tackle NCD’s at the grassroot level, we are happy to partner with Docon to develop and provide a sustainable way to prevent, identify and manage NCD’s across the country. The need for a centralized repository on patient information has been discussed at length but the implementation of this has not been a smooth journey. As a company that relies on the power of Science in the treatment and managing NCDs, we are committed to collaborating with relevant players in the ecosystem in advancing the best science and technology can offer in bettering patient outcomes.”

Akash Valia, Business & Growth Head at Docon Technologies, said “We are extremely excited to work alongside AstraZeneca’s team to further the cause of digitalization of doctor clinics and patient health record management. Non-communicable diseases have to be closely monitored and having access to detailed patient history is important for the Doctor to impart better treatment and improve patient outcome. Docon helps the doctor not only view patient history digitally but also consult & share the prescription directly on the patient’s smartphone. Technology is the key catalyst to reach every corner of India and improve healthcare in the country. At Docon our vision is to be a platform for all healthcare industry stakeholders to connect easily with each other. We are happy AstraZeneca is taking key steps to improving patient outcome via digitalization

Towards reaching the 1,000 clinics goal in 2021, on ground identification and support has been placed in 30 cities . Till now, as a part of the pilot phase, around 200 clinics have been upgraded with many of them being in Tier 1 & 2 towns. In addition to providing the clinicians with a 3 day in-clinic training for learning & adoption, a dedicated helpline is also being established for the users to understand and resolve technical queries.

In order to ensure safety and privacy, the data of the patient will be fully encrypted and stored in private cloud server to ensure highest security and only clinicians will have access to individual patient data. The program is also fully compliant to Telemedicine guidelines issued by NITI Aayog & Gazzette of India in March’ 2020.