Dozee, BII to transform public healthcare in India through MillionICU initiative, Health News, ET HealthWorld

Mumbai: Dozee, in partnership with British International Investment (BII), the UK’s development finance institution (DFI) and impact investor, is all set to upgrade 6000 hospital beds in 140 public hospitals across India and other regions, by incorporating their Million ICU initiative, which is India’s first AI-based contactless Remote Patient Monitoring (RPM) & Early Warning System (EWS).

The current public healthcare setting in India has a 1:40 nurse-to-patient ratio, in stark contrast to WHO’s recommended ratio of 1:4. Moreover, there is an acute shortage of ICU beds which is further worsened by the meagreness of hospital staff. Today, more than 95 per cent of the hospital beds in India are sub-optimally monitored with manual spot-checks limiting the ability for early detection of patients’ deteriorating conditions. This causes an increased workload on the under-resourced healthcare system.

Commenting on India’s dire need for advancing its healthcare delivery system, Mudit Dandwate, CEO and Co-founder, Dozed said, “According to the 2021 Niti Aayog report, India currently has 1.3 hospital beds per 1,000 population. There is also a shortage of skilled health workers, with 0.65 physicians per 1,000 people (the World Health Organisation standard is 1 per 1,000 people) and 1.3 nurses per 1,000 people, putting immense stress on the nation’s healthcare infrastructure. The public healthcare delivery system’s connected care model can help bridge this gap, supported by technological advancements such as AI-based early warning systems and contactless remote monitoring systems that have the potential to transform standard hospital beds into connected step-down ICU beds.”

The goal of Dozee’s partnership with BII is to improve access to healthcare across India and alleviate the workload of healthcare workers and reduce nurse burnout and fatigue in hospital wards. Dozee’s MillionICU initiative saves around two and a half hours of nursing time per patient per day in India. It was established in 2021 with the agenda to install one million step-down ICU beds across India.

Backed by BII’s capital, Dozee will upgrade regular beds to step-down ICUs through their MillionICU initiative, which has already benefited 46 such hospitals across 15 plus districts with more than 10,000 plus patients being monitored and having saved 25,000 plus nursing hours.

Speaking about the partnership, Manav Bansal, Managing Director and Head of India, BII concluded, “Improved access to affordable healthcare significantly boosts productivity and development outcomes. Our partnership with Dozee will help to scale tech-enabled healthcare solutions which will alleviate the burden on healthcare staff and increase patient’s access to quality and affordable healthcare in India over the long term and help improve clinical outcomes for patients in public hospitals in the country.