Bridging the Digital Health Divide

Telehealth services are transforming healthcare delivery in India, providing a critical solution for remote populations and any people facing barriers to accessing traditional in-person medical care. eSanjeevani, implementer of the Government of India’s major telehealth platform, have conducted more than 300 million consults at a rate of about 170,000 per day.

How is this healthcare evolution impacting the health and rehabilitation needs of people with disability? Professor Nathan Grills and the VirtuCare team worked with eSanjeevani to include a question on disability status in the telehealth consultation. This will support eSanjeevani to understand how best to serve those with disability using the de-identified data of the 20,000 people with disability who have utilised the eSanjeevani platform since December 2023.

The eSanjeevani virtual platform is performing well in digital accessibility, ensuring that healthcare services are inclusive and available to all individuals, including those with disabilities.  The eSanjeevani team have committed to improving the platform’s digital accessibility with our recent Mission Accessibility audit giving a score of 84%. VirtuCare and Mission Accessibility are partnering with eSanjeevani to achieve an accessibility score of 94%.

With the support of VirtuCare, eSanjeevani 2.0 will be an even more inclusive virtual healthcare platform. This will be transformative for people with disability who will have improved consistent access to a wide range of healthcare from the convenience of their home or local health centre.

The VirtuCare Project is supported by the Australian Government through the Australia-India Council of the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade. It is led by the University of Melbourne and has received in-kind support from partners including Public Health Foundation of India, PRASHO, The George Institute, Monash University, University of Adelaide, Infosys, the Emmanuel Hospital Association, Mission accessibility, CBM India, St Johns Medical college and eSanjeevani through the Centre for Development of Advanced Computing (Mohali, India).

Professor Nathan Grills, a Public Health Physician works largely in India on disability, non communicable diseases and health curriculum development and training. Nathan is leading the VirtuCare Project.