How a Whatsapp-inspired IIT-grad's app tackles India's doctor shortage

A problem beyond India’s low doctor-to-patient ratio is the distribution of those doctors. Most, particularly specialists, congregate in bigger cities and get seen by patients in the surrounding areas. Only 19 percent of specialists are available in community health centers across India, and most fall well below the country’s requirement for specialists. Community health centers are located in smaller towns and help patients in the area decide if they need to visit a larger, better-equipped city facility.

Satish Kannan was working for Philips Healthcare when he saw how inconvenient it was for patients in the small towns to report to clinics in big cities. This often involved them shelling out large amounts of money. “What the person does is sell everything they have and then have money for an operation,” Satish explains.

The other thing he noticed was how often patients were using Facebook and Whatsapp, particularly the latter, to communicate with their doctors post-appointment. Residents of small towns would be able to send over their test results, and they’d only need to make a return trip if there was a big problem.

If patients could connect with their doctors post-procedure, what was to say that they couldn’t connect that way beforehand?

In May last year, the startup scored funding from two of Facebook’s early investors and Rebright Partners, an investment firm with bases in Tokyo and Singapore. It’s served over 600,000 people in India in 3,000 locations.

DocsApp’s name is directly inspired by WhatsApp. As long as you have a chat screen on your phone, you can input your problems and location, find a doctor, and ask questions. A user can pay for his or her own appointment over mobile. If treatment requires a physical visit, the user’s money is refunded.

This is an excerpt from Tech in Asia. You can read the full article here