For the nearly 90% of people who are testing positive for COVID-19 and having either mild or no symptoms, home isolation is recommended. With the spurt in cases, several healthcare service providers have begun to offer “COVID-19 home isolation” packages to these patients.
These packages include a wide range of services, such as teleconsulting with specialists, the monitoring of vitals thrice a day, customised meals, and contactless delivery of medicines and other essentials. The service providers offer these packages for rates starting from ₹500 a day.
RxDx Multispeciality Clinic, with five outlets in the city, is seeing an average of 20 COVID-19 positive patients being onboarded every day. Ashwani Sinha, chief impact officer of RxDx, said that since the outbreak of COVID-19, the clinic has helped over 1,500 persons recover at home. “The other area of growth is in collection of home samples. In this alone, we have witnessed a huge demand and have begun servicing requests in a 15-km radius of all our five centres,” he said.
Sakra World Hospital, Whitefield, is also witnessing a huge demand for home isolation packages. According to a hospital representative, through the hospital’s app, video consultation with doctors and teleconsultation with nurses, dieticians, and psychologists are conducted. The hospital also provides a complete medical equipment kit for a separate charge.
Prashanth Patkar, founding team member and head of operations, Anvayaa Kin Care Pvt. Ltd., said the home quarantine care packages include remote consultation with pulmonologist/ general physician, remote monitoring of vitals by trained healthcare staff, psychologist consultation, customised diet plan, home delivery of home quarantine kit, home delivery of medicines and essentials, 24x7 ambulance for SOS support, among other things.
“We have treated over 1,000 patients so far with 98% recovery rate. We also have an app-based service exclusively designed for senior citizens that allows one to keep tabs on the well-being of their loved ones,” he added.
But not everyone is on board with this. When her father was tested positive, Deeksha Vasanth (name changed) , a resident of Basavanagudi, got to know of one such service provider, who quoted ₹8,000 for 14 days.
“This included video consultation with a doctor once a day and the monitoring of vitals, including oxygen level and blood pressure. Since we had all the necessary medical equipment, I decided against opting for the service,” she said.
