Apollo Hospitals, Rochester Medical Center tie up

Tie up would enable hospital to work i n the areas of emergency medicine, neurology, liver transplant, gastroenterology and patient care

Superspeciality health services provider Apollo Hospitals has joined hands with the US-based University of Rochester Medical Center to collaborate in areas including emergency medicine, neurology, liver transplant, gastroenterology and patient care through a faculty-student exchange programme.

According to Apollo chairman Prathap C Reddy, the partnership would help Team Apollo to learn and accustom to evolving practices in the aforesaid areas, therefore helping it to face domestic challenges in treating patients for diseases including cancer, heart, hepatology and better management of tele-medicine.

Apollo Hospitals, which has 20 health skill training centres in India, also indicated its willingness to start undergraduate medical colleges. However, the “apex body Medical Council of India (MCI) regulations a big hurdle at this juncture,” said Reddy. At present, only registered societies are allowed to establish and run medical academic institutions in the country.

To cater to the requirements of the healthcare industry through a designated platform, Reddy said  ‘NatHealth’ will be launched on October 24 this year. NatHealth will be an association of private healthcare companies on the lines of software services body Nasscom.

Speaking on the tie-up, Sangita Reddy, executive director, Apollo, said, “The faculty-student programme will help us design our post graduate academic curriculum on a par with global practices, adopt best clinical practices, which would later be extended to training in nursing and emergency medical technicians.”

Celebrating its 25 years into the healthcare services, it has announced an initiative to provide free general checkup for 25,000 patients in 25 days from tomorrow.