Telemedicine service now in Ghana!

A medical revolution has been launched under County Group of Hospitals of Kumasi and Apollo Group of Hospitals in India, following the launch of telemedicine in Ghana at the Abenkyiman Hospital at Anhwiankwanta in the Bekwai Municipality.

Apollo Hospitals is the largest telemedicine provider in India with 71 centres. Telemedicine is the use of telecommunication and information technology in order to provide clinical health care from a distance.

It helps eliminate distance barriers, and can improve access to medical services that would often not be consistently available in distant rural communities. It is also used to save lives in critical care and emergency situations.

Early forms of telemedicine achieved with telephone and radio have been supplemented with video telephony, advanced diagnostic methods, supported by distributed client/server applications, and additionally, with telemedical devices to support in-home care.

Telemedicine, by which the best healthcare is brought to everybody through the expertise of highly qualified doctors through technology, was successfully launched at the Abenkyiman Hospital on Nov 8 2013.

The partnership, initiated by Dr. Kwame Antwi, Chief Executive Officer of County Hospitals, is to exploit the clinical excellence of the Indian counterparts.

A group of medical experts from India are currently doing feasibility studies towards establishing a referral centre in telemedicine in the next years.

Dr. K. Hari Prasad, Chief Executive of Apollo Hospitals, an expert in acute stroke treatment, who is leading a group of nine medical experts, said the team would also launch a “”medical camp””, where specialists would avail their expertise and services to clients in the treatment and management of kidney, liver and stroke, among other ailments, at Abenkyiman.

The Apollo Chief Executive gave the assurance that about 85,000 medical experts involved in Apollo would support Dr. Antwi to realise his vision of making Abenkyiman a destination of excellence in telemedicine in Ghana.

Dr. Kwame Antwi said services at the centre were affordable, and that it would cost between GH50 and GH100 to access telemedicine, through which patients would be connected to the best doctors around the globe.

The Member of Parliament for Bekwai, Joseph Osei-Owusu, who witnessed the launching of the technology, commended Dr. Antwi for the foresight and championing the introduction of telemedicine in Ghana, and hoped Ghanaians would take advantage of the facility, which is intended to further enhance quality healthcare delivery.