New app allows patients to consult doctors from comfort of home, office

‘My Follow Up’ developed by doctors at Sir Ganga Ram Hospital can be downloaded free of cost on Android and iOS phones

Worried about making it to the hospital for your next follow-up appointment? If yes, stress no more.

Doctors at Sir Ganga Ram Hospital have come up with a mobile application called ‘My Follow Up’ to ensure that patients continue to have “stress-free” access to treatment.

‘Immensely popular’

“My Follow Up is up and running and immensely popular with patients at Sir Ganga Ram Hospital. It can be downloaded free of cost on Android and iOS phones. The application allows patients to share reports, pictures, prescriptions and seek detailed telephonic consultations. Physicians can restrict these consultations to a time of their choice. Since it is an interactive call, the physician’s mobile number isn’t circulated. At the end of the telephonic interaction, the physician generates an electronic prescription that the app instantly sends to the patient,” explained Dr. Sudhir Kalhan, who is advisor, Doctor’s Forum and co-chairperson, Department of Minimal Invasive Surgery at the hospital.

Explaining how the app was conceptualised, Dr. D.S Rana, who is chairman, Board of Management (Sir Ganga Ram Hospital), said that the hospital has about 25% to 30% outstation patients seeking specialised treatment at any given time. “The hospital is always overbooked. Many patients can’t be accommodated despite best efforts due to lack of beds,” he said.

Outstation people benefit

“We felt that not only can many of our outstation patients be diagnosed at the local level, but also be treated if given expert advice through a smartphone application. This led us to approach a technology partner, who helped us develop an application that benefits our outstation patients. More than 5,000 patients have benefited from this application in the last three months,” said Dr. Kalhan.

“The app connects you to your doctor and ensures that follow-up visits with specialists are a multimedia experience that can be undertaken from the comfort of your home or office,” he added.

“The application is a boon for patients who need regular medical follow-ups, but don’t live in Delhi. For instance, we were able to help a young Kashmiri woman who had been trying to conceive since seven years. Treatment for infertility, notably, requires frequent follow-ups for ovarian follicular scans and reviews for treatment interventions. This patient was suffering from Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome, which required gonadotropin injections to be given along with concurrent follicular monitoring. The app offered the perfect platform for sharing scans and tweaking medical intervention to get the desired results,” said Dr. Abha Majumdar, director, Centre of IVF & Human Reproduction at the hospital.