The Ernakulam District General Hospital has become part of the Smart City project with Cochin Smart Mission Limited investing over ₹30 crore for various development projects.
Three components have been identified by the Mission that will up-scale the GH into a smart health service provider. They are: a cancer annex block costing ₹25 crore, e-Health programme costing ₹3.76 crore and ₹40-lakh solar project that will generate 70 kilo watt electricity.
While the cancer annexe block is at stage one – where paperwork for a new building is on, the process of changing over to the e-Health system has begun. It is being implemented by Keltron as part of the State’s e-Health programme.
For the solar project, installation on the casualty block has been completed and is likely to be commissioned next month. It is among the 28 government buildings in the city that will be turned into solar energy generating units.
The hospital is expecting to go digital in about 3-4 months which will herald a new chapter after it made the first makeover with NABH accreditation in 2011.
Patient-services will be enhanced as queuing up for services will become passe. Registration for OP tickets and payments for various tests would become easy. The practice now is to reach the hospital early and queue up in front of the OP ticket counter to get an early ticket.
Dr. A. Anitha, the hospital superintendent, said that e-Health would also deliver all the diagnostic laboratory results directly to the doctor’ s computer. Patients’ medical records generated electronically would make available all the medical history to the treating doctors. If the patients seek to take treatment elsewhere, these records would be of great help too, she added.
