IMA National Telemedicine Day

Posted by ramana kovelamudi

 

It was on March 24th 2000 that the world’s first Prasad hospital (VSAT provided by ISRO for Prasad Hospitals, Aragonda was formally commissioned by Mr. Bill Clinton, the then president of the USA.It was on March 24th 2000 that the world’s first Prasad hospital (VSAT provided by ISRO for Prasad Hospitals, Aragonda was formally commissioned by Mr. Bill Clinton, the then president of the USA.Learnings from this innovation, led to ISRO including Telemedicine as one of its major societal initiatives. On March 24th 2015, the Indian Medical Association formally declared March 24th as IMA National Telemedicine Day. The 275,000 strong Indian Medical Association with 1700 branches (www.ima-india.org), the world’s largest professional body of medical doctors) is joining hands with the Telemedicine Society of India (www.tsi.org) and ISRO (www.isro.gov.in) to ensure that the country is informed of what has been done, and more importantly what needs to be done, using Telemedicine to bridge the ever increasing urban rural health divide.

Building more hospitals, medical colleges, increasing retirement age of doctors, producing more doctors, nurses, para medics etc alone is not enough. The exponential growth in Information and Communication Technology is today making distance, meaningless.

It is well known that creating massive awareness of specific conditions go a very long way in its utilization. There are more than 300 days associated with healthcare alone