Dr Mukund Bhagat, CEO of SSA-India, who presented the demonstration at the Sterling Hospital, said the technology could remove the professional isolation of the rural doctors by providing them the opportunity to interact and work with senior specialists in the city.

He said SSA- India, which has 15 centres across the state, including five super-speciality hospitals in Ahmedabad, Vadodara, Nadiad and Surat, now even catered to patients in the bordering areas like Idar, Prantij, Atladra and Bardoli, through “peripheral” hospitals by virtue of video-conferencing.

He said that by using technologies such as Very Small Aperture Terminal (VSAT) and Integrated Digital Services Network (ISDN), the transmission of various medical data such as X-Rays, ECG, CT Scan and echocardiography is accomplished along with the live images of the patients and the inputs of the rural doctors.

Patients only have to pay for the medicines and the medical tests while the cost of the communication service will be borne by the hospitals, he said.

Pointing out the benefits of telemedicine, Dinesh Parikh, a doctor practicing in the tribal regions of Banaskantha along the Gujarat-Rajasthan border said: “With the help of this technology, we could not only cure patients, but by setting up VSAT units in one of the local hospitals in Banswada, we could also hasten the process of anti-natal registration in these areas, which have a high infant mortality rate (IMR).”