Apollo Hospitals to have 3,000 beds under real-time patient monitoring

Apollo Hospitals on Monday launched its nationwide 'Comprehensive Connected Care programme'. The comprehensive service equips clinical teams and nursing staff with a real-time view of patients at various stages of their healthcare journey, including emergency and ambulance services, in-patient care, post-surgery recovery and home care.

This care technology, underpinned by artificial intelligence (AI), also monitors and detects early signs of patient deterioration, enabling timely corrective action. It allows nurses and doctors to remotely monitor patient health from nursing stations, command centres or mobile devices. Based on system data and the patient's electronic medical record, doctors at Apollo's regional command centres can assess patients' conditions and recommend further support or treatment.

Apollo introduced its Enhanced Connected Care programme in pilot mode earlier this year, leading to improvements in quality, safety and overall patient satisfaction. The programme has saved an hour of nursing time per shift, reduced patient readmissions to the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) by 30 per cent, detected eight to ten early warning critical alerts per 100 monitored beds and minimised emergency "code blue" calls.

By the end of the year, Apollo aims to equip 3,000 beds with real-time response patient monitoring systems in its Hyderabad and Bangalore units. Currently, it has 1,000 beds under this programme. Apollo's Jayanagar and Hyderguda hospitals in Bangalore and Hyderabad provide enhanced connected care coverage to all in-patients, making them India's first fully smart hospitals.

Sangita Reddy, joint managing director of Apollo, stated, "As the technology advances, patients will experience better health outcomes and increased access to healthcare, while clinicians can maximise their time, make more informed decisions and deliver continuous care."

Ravi P Mahajan, director of Critical Care Integration and Transformation at Apollo, stated they are prepared to extend these services across all their 70-plus hospitals in India.