Challenges faces by expanding Healthcare sector in India

India features a competitive advantage with its high quality and low cost medical care compared to other Asian countries or the West. It also has a huge patient pool, a favourable regulatory environment and price advantages for conducting clinical trials. This has boosted the country's medical tourism, attracting patients from across the planet .

However, the healthcare system faces many challenges mostly thanks to poor implementation of public health programmes and increase in life expectancy. Widespread poverty and illiteracy means an outsized segment of the population has poor access to healthcare or low utilisation of the available resources. With government programmes failing to satisfy the demand, there has been a phenomenal growth of personal healthcare providers in terms of capacity, geographic spread and business.

Healthcare requires an assimilated delivery model with a network of hospitals (both secondary and tertiary care), rural healthcare delivered at the doorstep, disease management set-up and residential based healthcare. Telemedicine is a fast emerging sector. In 2012, the telemedicine market was valued at $7.5 million, and is predicted to grow to $ 18.7 million by 2017. There is a big scope for enhancing healthcare services considering that healthcare spending as a percentage of Gross Domestic Product(GDP) is rising. Rural India, which accounts for over 70 per cent of the population, will emerge as a possible demand source. As of now, barely three percent of specialist physicians cater to rural demand.

The five year tax holiday for private players venturing into Tier-II cities gave an encouragement to hospitals to tap the potential in these markets. There is an enormous demand and supply gap in multispeciality care in Tier-II cities which are mostly dominated by nursing homes and hospitals with a limited range of services. There's a need for organised multispeciality tertiary care services.

Tier-II and III cities create several challenges - resource constraints, inadequate medical infrastructure, low income level and unethical practices. Tier-II hospitals also can act as a hub for secondary and first care initiatives, taking healthcare to those it's yet reached. They will help to reach patients in peripheral towns and villages in those states, providing them primary, secondary and tertiary care.

These days, patients comes with multiple problems and a single doctor is not in a position to handle everything. Interpersonal skills are not taught in medical schools. But in a hospital, there is a requirement to work as a team. Building an honest multidisciplinary team is vital to running a hospital successfully. Thus, hospitals need staff equipped with domain knowledge of medicine and doctors who understand administrative problems.

Modern medicine still does not have all the answers to all or any our ailments. But in particular , people need to change their thought process. Psychosocial factors are critical reasons for mental damage. It is imperative that we glance into holistic healing to take care of a healthy population and a healthy country.

THE GROWING GIANT : 

• The healthcare sector is expected to grow at a compound annual growth rate of 15.2 percent by 2017 to reach 160 billion dollar.Increasing consumer awareness and demand for better facilities has redefined healthcare as the country’s second largest service sector employer.

• The private sector has emerged as a key player with its share in healthcare delivery expected to increase from 66 percent 2005 to 81 percent by 2015.

• The diagnostics sector has also been witnessing immense progress with better systems and equipment.Healthcare providers in India are expected to spend 1.08 billion dollar on IT products and services in 2014,a four percent increase over 2013.