Nephroplus bets big on 'dialysis vacation' in India

Now, kidney dialysis can be possible on the Kerala back-waters too. With an aim to provide dialysis care for tourists undergoing dialysis, Nephroplus, a Hyderabad-based kidney care dialysis chain, is planning to set up dialysis centres in various tourist destinations like Goa, Pondicherry and Alleppay in the next three to four months.

"As there are no dialysis centres available across tourist destinations, patients undergoing dialysis mostly fear to go for long holidays. We have come up with this concept called 'dialysis vacation', where patients without worrying about infection can go for long holidays to these places," Vikram Vuppala, founder and chief executive officer of Nephroplus, told Business Standard.

For example, if a patient travels to backwaters in Kerala for three days, he can get his four-hour dialysis done on the boat or a nearby dialysis centre. "Similarly, we are currently identifying tourist destinations across the country to set up these centres," he said.

Nephroplus will be a one-stop for the patients-cum-tourists and make available all facilities starting from booking a hotel to booking a flight. "We are currently in discussion with travel portals like makemytrip.com and cleartrip.com, and the tie-up may happen in the next three months," he said.

"Dialysis vacation is a new concept for India, while it already exists in Europe and some parts of the US. The idea struck us when Kamal Shah, one of the co-founders of Nephroplus and a dialysis patient, got his dialysis done on a cruise in Alaska," Vuppala said.

The company, which is majorly present in south India, has recently forayed into the northern markets with a centre in New Delhi. It has plans to open one centre in Rohtak this year.

Nephroplus, which has set a target of reaching 100 centres by 2015, currently has four stand-alone centres and 12 in-hospital centres in partnership with various hospitals across the country. "Each unit costs between Rs 80 lakh and Rs 1 crore, depending on the size and location of the units," he said.

The company has plans to raise a Series-B funding by the end of this calendar year, for which it will start discussions during June. "So far, we have used less than 50 per cent of the fund which we had raised from venture capital firm Bessemer Partners in 2011. With a robust expansion lined up for this year, we may exhaust the fund by the end of this calendar year," said Vuppala.