On Friday, November 3^rd, Telemedicine of society (TSI) in collaboration with International Society for Telemedicine and ehealth (ISfTeH) kicked off its 19^th international conference “Telemedicon-2023” in Goa, the city of sun and sand. More than three hundred professionals attended the conference on day 1. The event unfolded with Dr Meenu Singh, Director AIIMS Rishikesh and current President of TSI along with Dr Michele Griffith, senior internal Medicine specialist and President of ISfTeH, welcoming the dignitaries followed by  lamp lighting to mark the beginning of a day filled with knowledge, understanding and awareness. The morning sessions focused on the and hot and trending topics of emerging technologies, future trends in  healthcare/vaccine delivery and government initiatives. It was a star studded speaker ensemble with the likes of Mr Vimal Wakhlu, a highly experienced telecom and IT professional and the former Chairman & Managing Director of Telecommunications Consultants India Ltd. speaking on Emerging Technologies, Mr Philip Gibbs, co-Founder and CEO of the Disruption Lab, a digital platform where health, tech, and innovation leaders gather to transform the delivery of care talking about how  counter intuitive but perfectly predictable is the future of healthcare delivery and  Dr Anant Madabhushi, Ph.D. a Robert W. Woodruff Professor across several prominent departments explaining all about Al for Precision Medicine. Take home message from this session was that lessons from innovation theory can teach us how to design the system for better results—better outcomes, easier access, lower cost. Patterns across industries inform predictions about healthcare’s future. Counterintuitive concepts challenge us. Systems enabling rapid learning, drive innovation design and better results. Mr. Hitt Sharma,  additional Medical Director at Serum Institute of India Pvt. Ltd, took the audience through the future trends in vaccine delivery and spoke about changing the HPV landscape with an Indigenous Vaccine – CERVAVAC. The burden of cervical cancer in India is very high , it being the fourth most common cancer among the women globally. and widespread use of HPV vaccine dramatically reduces the number of women who will develop cervical cancer. Health care delivery has been dominated traditionally by hospitals  and  Mr Behram Kodaiji, group CEO of Ruby Hall Clinics spoke on how  technology driven Hospitals can deliver better patient care. These enlightening talks were followed by a great panel discussion on Al and digital health in the acute Care setting by panellists Dr Michelle Griffith and Mr Michael Castorino, Director of HP WW Strategic Healthcare Alliances chaired by Dr Selva Kumar, an accomplished neurosurgeon, Chairman and Founder Member of TSI for the past two decades and Dr Tapas Kumar Singh, Assistant Professor in the Department of Anaesthesiology, SGPGIMS, Lucknow, India followed by Dr. B S Ratta  and Dr Michele Griffith chairing the 1^st Telemedicon 2023 Oration by Dr Rajendra Pratap Gupta, Board Member of the International Society for Telemedicine & eHealth (ISfTeH) and founder of Health Parliament and Digital Health Academy. A rapid fireside chat session with Mr Devang Mody, CEO of Bajaj Finserv Health, was invigorating and the audience loved the energy, passion and dynamism that Mr Mody displayed towards health care accessibility through technology. The government is taking equally important steps towards the digital movement in healthcare and It was very heartening to hear esteemed speakers Ms Tryphosa I S, State Coordinator at the National Health Authority within the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, Government of India, Dr K Madan Gopal Advisor – Public Health Administration at NHSRC-MoHFW, GOI, Mr Gaur Sunder, Associate Director (Scientist F) at the Centre for Development of Advanced Computing (C-DAC, Pune  and Mr Anantha Raman Iyer, Director of Information and Communications Technology at UP TSU, where he leads technology initiatives for the government of Uttar Pradesh  speaking on government initiatives such as Ayushman Bharat Digital Mission, leveraging Emerging Technologies to Connect Healthcare Systems and a case study on Digital Health initiative in Uttar Pradesh. The session closed with a very interesting quiz session conducted by Dr. K Ganapathy, Founder President of the Apollo Telemedicine Networking Foundation (ATNF) and past President TSI, followed by inauguration of the exhibition on convergence of healthcare and technologies at the Bajaj Hall, by Dr. Michael Lobo, MLA, Goa showcasing over 50 trending products.

 

The afternoon sessions of the “Telemedicon-2023” in Goa, the 19^th International conference of TSI in collaboration with ISfTeH saw experts coming together  to have a dialogue on the telehealth scenario at a global level. Mr Vimal Wakhlu, the former Chairman & Managing Director of Telecommunications Consultants India Ltd. (TCIL) and Dr Sandeep Sahu chaired the session  with Ms Tory Cenaj, Founder and Publisher of Partners in Digital Health (PDH) speaking on The Future of Equal Access Global Interoperable Care. This was a virtual talk followed by some really enlightening and interesting talks on cybersecurity in healthcare, telehealth ecosystem  best last mile connectivity in health care intervention by distinguished speakers , Mr Bijender Mishra, Chief Information Security Officer (CISO) at Alkem Laboratories Ltd, Mumbai, Mr Anurag Vohra CTO, Bajaj Finserv Health and Dr R Kim, chief medical officer Aravind Eye Hospital, Madurai. The buzzword of the decade – “AI”  which has the potential to transform how humans learn, work and interact with one another in every aspect of life, is set to revolunize healthcare. Insightful learnings were obtained during talks by Mr Lalit Singla, CEO of IA Pulse at India Accelerator, Mr Pratosh Mathur, Executive Vice President of Sales at DeepTek.ai, Dr Dhruv Joshi Co-founder and CEO of Cloudphysician on ways AI is helping drive healthcare forward—and how it is being used to help improve the quality of medical care around the world through AI powered connected medical devices, AI driven radiology, smart ICUs This session was chaired by Prof Yunkup Kwankam and Dr Gaurish Surlakar, consultant radiologist. No great feat has ever been achieved without challenges, hurdles and pitfall , the same with telemedicine and this was explained in great depth by none other than Dr. Devi Shetty, chairman and founder of Narayana Health hospitals. One such challenge on how to solve for specialty care “Deserts” through virtual second opinion was addressed by Ms Deepika Grandhi, Cleveland Clinic’s Business Development Head for India, Dr Peter Rasmussen Chief Clinical Officer at the Cleveland Clinic in a session chaired by Mr Michael Castorino, Director of HP WW Strategic Healthcare Alliances  and  Dr P K Pradhan, Professor at the Sanjay Gandhi Postgraduate Institute of Medical Sciences in Lucknow. Parallel sessions were being held in Suquino hall with workshops on Teleopthalmology and masterclass on role of telemedicine in digital health ecosystem by Dr Uma Nambiar.  Bajaj hall saw the industry from healthcare showcasing quality healthcare by Televital, needle free injection system by Integri Medical, ophthalmic screening and diagnostics by Remedio, remote cardiac diagnosis by Tricog, Sun Pharma, smart ICU technology and remote patient monitoring system by Cloud Physician, Tele ICU service by Entel Healthtech, video conferencing solutions by People Link and medical diagnostic Products by Hemocue. 20 scientific paper presentations and 15 posters were showcased in Google Hall. The first day culminated with the formal inaugural ceremony, the welcome address was delivered by the organising chairman, Dr B S Ratta, renowned pediatric surgeon and organizing chairman of Telemedicon 2023 followed by Dr  Anushri Mukhopadhyay, speaking  on Philosophy in Medicine and The Wisdom Beyond  and Prof Dr K Ganapathy giving  the Historical Perspectives of TSI. The president of TSI and ISfTeH Dr Meenu Singh and Dr.Michelle Griffith delivered their address and the secretaries of TSI and ISfTeH,  Dr Murthy Remilla and Prof  Yunkap Kwankum presented their report. Shri Chandrakant Shetye, Chairman, Infotech Corporation of Goa Ltd was the chief guest for the event and Dr Rajendra Pratap Gupta, the Guest of Honour. Dr Shetye welcomed all delegates to the state of Goa and spoke about how Goa has seen a lot of changes in terms of digitization which is the need of the hour. The key take away message was that the patient should be the focus of all technological developments. He also spoke about being cautious about medical negligence and appropriate measures to be taken while providing teleconsultations.The vote of thanks was extended by organizing secretary, Dr S V Kulkarni.

 

The 2^nd day of Telemdicon opened with a session being Chaired by Col Dr Ashwini Goel, Founder Member & Past President, Telemedicine Society of India (TSI), Dr Sunil Shroff  a distinguished Senior Consultant Urologist & Transplant Consultant at Madras Medical Mission Hospital and MGM Healthcare in Chennai with keynote speaker Rifat Latifi, Chairman of Surgery Consultants International LLC, Adjunct Professor of Surgery at the University of Arizona, Former Chairman of Surgery at New York Medical College addressing the crowd virtually on perioperative Telemedicine and  Interesting talks on subjects like the role of accreditation in improving quality and patient safety in Telehealth Services, legal, regulatory and ethical issues around electronic patient generated Health Data  by Dr Bhupendra Kumar Rana, CEO of Quality & Accreditation Institute (QAI ). The session chaired by Dr Selva Kumar, Mr Phillip E. Gibbs saw the launch of Suquino’s “Saffron Telehealth”  in India. Suquino is a renowned name offering sterling services in the  IOT healthcare domain. Mr Ravi Amble, CEO  with his team Ms Meredith Sossman, global VP, Mr Larry England, and Dr V S Hegde, retired Chairman, ISRO showcased Saffron which is a ML AI driven, PaaS platform. It integrates third party medical devices, systems and software to enable holistic and remote care in real time within a connected care ecosystem. It is HIPPA compliant, vendor neutral and secure as well. The company won the peer reviewed health value award from the validation institute. Mr Srinivas Sardar ,from Healthy Vibes launched his product which does real time patient monitoring in an automated and programmable health care settings in and out of hospitals.This was followed by launch of Lords mark microbiotech product “ My DNA” which helps in precision medicine using gene sequencing for cancer, heart wellness, fitness and nutrition,  women and children, by CEO Mr Subodh Gupta. This was followed by panel discussion on Remote Monitoring of Substance Use Disorder (Focused on adolescents and young adults chaired by Dr R Kim, Dr Suresh Bada Math and esteemed panelists Dr Sreya Chattopadhayay, Director General of Police, Goa, Mr Jaspal Singh, Dr Dheeraj Mehrotra. Presidential Oration was delivered by Dr. Meenu Singh with Felicitation of Past President Col Dr Ashwini Goel and change of Medallion from Dr Meenu Singh to Dr. R Kim as the President Elect of Telemedicine Society of India. Dr R Kim is the CEO and director of Aravind Eye Care Hospital of Madurai.

The next very important session was on the current buzzwords in healthcare -AI and ML, chaired by Professor S Raghvan and  Dr K Sudarshan, CEO of Ramesh Hospital, Vijaywada. This session saw Mr Praveen Bist, from Amrita Institute of Medical sciences, Faridabad discuss AI in healthcare, the role of Tele-health in decarbonising and building a resilient health system by Dr Karan Thakur, Simplicity in Healthcare Technology, Keeping care simple by Mr Amol Gadave and Mr Mahesh Rao, healthcare entrepreneurs and using AI/ML to integrate healthcare systems by Mr Karthik Adapa, Secretary Govt. of Punjab.The prelunch session ended with quiz master Prof Ganapathy conducting a nail biting quiz with the winners of each round getting an award sponsored by Optrascan, a digital pathology leader.

 

The Day 2 afternoon session started with a session on space and telemedicine being chaired by Dr Murthy Remilla, Senior Scientist at ISRO, Head of Project Management at UR Rao Satellite Centre (URSC), Bangalore and virtual talks on Gaganyaan mission by cosmonaut Lt. Col Sergei Nikolayevich Revin, Dr Kaz Shimada sharing his insights on being an astronaut, microgravity experiments on international space station by Dr Jayakumar Venkatesan, International scenario of human space missions and health care by Dr Shwana Pandya.

Post the session on space and tele medicine was the most awaited session on innovations chaired by Mr Ashwin Desai and Dr Shekhar Salkar. During this session, Mr Pramod Gaur, from PACE university, USA spoke on digital Innovations and Partnerships in Addressing Social Determinants of Health and Wellbeing to Foster Sustainable Communities, there was a talk on  Impact of Technology on Hospitals by Mr. Vinod N. Sawantwadkar, CEO Jehangir Hospital, ROI in Digital Health by Dr Alok Roy, ex-chairman of Medica group of hospitals, Kolkata. Key take home message Digital Health Innovations and broad interoperability is making possible to deliver healthcare seamlessly wherever the patient is – at home; at doctor’s office; at community clinic; at urgent care facility or at hospital. This emerging patient centric care model allows to address clinical, mental and social care issues at both individual and community levels.  It is estimated that over 70% – to 75% of health-related outcomes are dependent on the social determinants of health. Emerging care models are presented to achieve healthy & sustainable communities. Session on AI was chaired by Dr Neha Nigam and Dr Uma Nahar Saikia covering topics like Al enabled Tele-pathology by Mr Abhi Gholap, Optrascan USA, Al in Digital Pathology by Dr Sangeeta Desai, Head of Pathology in Tata Memorial Hospital and  a virtual session on AI in drug delivery by Dr Dharshan Medhane from Seoul university, Korea, AI in wound care by podiatrist Dr Sanjay Sharma. Parallelly in Suquino Hall sessions were being held on topics related to tele surgery and a workshop on overview of operational issues of Telemedicine Application. Bajaj hall saw the industry participation by Maestros Electronics, Optrascan,CDAC,, NATIONAL HEALTH RESOUCE CENTRE FOR HER STANDARDIZATION. E sanjavini. Alkem, Suquino, Healthy Vibes.AI, Softlink International and Deeptek. There were 14 podium presentations chaired by Mr Arvind Tyagi, Dr Devdutt Sail, Dr Babita Angle and Dr Deepak Vohra.

The previous night of Telemedicon witnessed a high energy award function where eminent personalities of TSI were awarded for their outstanding contribution in the field of Telemedicine and the tremendous impact made. The “Mr. Eyeconic” award went to Dr. Senthil Tamilarasan, an ophthalmologist and healthcare entrepreneur known for his innovative thinking in making eye care accessible to the masses and Ms Eyeconic” award went to Sheila John, Head of the Teleophthalmology and E-Learning Departments at Sankara Nethralaya in Chennai for working relentlessly for TSI with a never say no attitude. “The king of Telemedicine operations” award went to Mr.Kishore Reddy Akepati, a highly experienced professional with a diverse educational background, holding MBAs in Information Technology and Hospital Administration and  has a strong track record of successfully initiating and overseeing numerous telemedicine projects.

“The king of Live Telesurgery and Video Collaboration went to Ashwin Desai, Ashwin Desai is a Telemedicine & Tele Education evangelist, currently serving as the Managing Director of A & T Video Networks Pvt. Ltd.,

“The  rising star of TSI” award went to Dr. Sanjay Sharma, a highly qualified and experienced Podiatric Surgeon and Wound Care Specialist, he is recognized as a thought leader in Telemedicine & Podiatry.

“The rockstar engineer of TSI” award went to Dr. S. Raghavan is a highly accomplished Professor in the Electronics and Communication Engineering Department at the National Institute of Technology (N.I.T.), Tiruchirappalli, with 38 years of teaching and research experience.

“The Marathon Man” award went to Dr. Murthy Remilla, a seasoned scientist with 34 years of experience at ISRO, for being the longest honorary secretary and opening the maximum number of state chapters.

“The TSI Geek Award goes to Repu Raman Chand

“The News King of TSI” went to  Dr. Sunil Shroff, a distinguished Senior Consultant Urologist & Transplant Consultant at Madras Medical Mission Hospital and MGM Healthcare in Chennai.

Dr Umashankar Subramanian was awarded “The paper Man of TSI” for meticulously maintaining all the very important records of TSI.

Dr. Uma Nambiar, “Vigyan Guru of TSI” an accomplished neurosurgeon and adept hospital administrator

“KAUN BANEGA TELEPATI” Dr. Krishnan Ganapathy, M.Ch. (Neurosurgery), FACS, FICS, FAMS, PhD, is a distinguished neurosurgeon with a remarkable career having held leadership roles in prestigious medical societies, including the Telemedicine Society of India and the Neurological Society of India.

The magnificent conference would not have been possible without the support of magnanimous sponsors and partners- Serum Institute of India  – Platinum Sponsor, Bajaj Health – Gold Sponsor, Ruby Hall Clinic – Healthcare Partner,

The Rising star in teleradiology award went to DeepTek for making tremendous progress in the field of AI in teleradiology. The “ Star debutants award of TSI” goes to Healthy Vibes, suquino and Lord’s Mark for a successful launch of their product.

The final day opened with a panel discusion by Teleopthalmology Society of India being chaired by Dr Amit Agarwal, Project Lead, Regional Resource Centre (North), Department of Telemedicine, National Medical College Network, MoHFW, GoI and Dr Swati Divyal Pai covering topics like real time use of AI in ophthalmology, rural Teleopthalmology, environment and economic impact of Teleopthalmology and business models in Teleopthalmology. The eminent speakers for this session were R Kim, Der Sheila John , Dr Padmaja Rani and Dr Senthil Tamilarasan. This was followed by a session on past, present and future of telehealth in India being chaired by, Major General Dr. A K Singh and Dr K Sudarshan, the speakers being Dr PK Pradhan, Mr. Piotr Skarzynski and Dr Suni Shroff, speaking on Innovative telehealth care delivery in primary care, teleaudiology and telemedicine practise guidelines-version 2. The last session of the day was  chaired by Dr Vikrant Kanwar and Dr Sangeeta Desai, Professor and Head, Pathology, Tata Memorial Centre covering topics on needle free devices by Mr Rohit Mitra, head of Business Development at Integri Medical, healthcare startups by Ms Akriti Bajaj, Senior AVP Invest India and Precision Telehealth platform by Dr Uma Shankar. The grand 3 day conference which was an academic feast closed with the valedictory function  of installation of new office bearers and prize distribution ceremony for all the contests held during the 3 day event the winners of which were for the best essay contest, 1st Dr. Anish Mahashankar Joshi, 2nd Dr Vibhav Verlekar & 3rd Dr Arjun Jichkar. For best podium presentation 1st Dr Uma Nahar Saikia & 2nd Dr Shiela John. For best poster – 1st Dr Anil Chauhan & 2nd Dr. Hima Bindu Kotamarthy. Lucky dip winner, Maj. Gen. Dr A K Singh best hopper of the day followed by the vote of thanks.

Dr. B. S. Ratta
Organising Chairman 

TSI Maharashtra Chapter and Ruby Hall Clinic jointly organized the International Telemedicine Conference on 9th, 10th, and 11th Nov. 2017 at the Sheraton Grand in Pune. The theme of the conference was “Digital Health – Shaping The Future of Health Care” As usual we had a mixed audience including Doctors, Engineers, IT specialist, Regulators, Policy makers, Researchers, vendors, innovators, and a contingent from Russia and Baltic showcasing Telemedicine and communication technologies currently in vogue. The conference was attended by more than 350 participants from India and Abroad. Key topics covered were Telepractices viz. Tele Cardiology, Tele Oncology, Tele Diabetes,Tele Radiology, Tele Psychiatry, Tele Stroke, Tele Ophthalmology, Telemedicine in extreme environment, Virtual clinics, e Labs, e ICU. Presentations were par excellent and good discussions were generated during each sessions, and lots of participants requested organizers for more time. Another highlight was the Indo Russian Forum, represented by 5 Russians in connection with 70th year of Indo Russian Friendship Treaty and the BRICS session both of which were coordinated by Dr. S. K. Mishra our own P. P. TSI and Maharashtra Chapter places on record, its gratitude to the doyen for all his help. Plenary sessions, Legal & Regulatory sessions, Telemedicine Networks around the world were other highlights of the conference.
For the first time Maharashtra Chapter initiated The Awards for Best Mobile App for Virtual Clinic, Best App for Social Responsibility, Best Paper etc.

 

The Conference was recognized by Maharashtra Medical Council, Mumbai with 4 Credit hours.

 

EDM, Brochures, Posters were used to spread the message of TelePractices via social media, emails and sms. Local Press covered the event adequately Great Demonstrations like AmbuPod, 108 Ambulance Services, in Maharashtra, Practice Management Apps, Mental Health Demonstration TeleECHO by NIMHANS, Workshop on EHR / Standardizations by CDAC were well received. Keynotes address, by IMA President Dr. Ravi Wankhedkar, led to IMA, committing at National level to hold National Telemedicine Day on 24th March every year, Town Hall meeting with Dr. Khalid Moidu USA drew lot of interest in terms of capacity building in Telemedicine. Healthcare Digital Future by Avaya and Reaching the Unreached in immunization by Serum Institute of Indias Dr. Prasad Kulkarni and Tele Paediatric led by Dr. Meenu Singh and Dr. Dhananjay Mangal were eye openers.

 

Conference also discussed 3D Printing, Block Chain, Artificial Intelligence and 360̊ Interoperability in Healthcare, State Telemedicine Network, by Odisha & Maharashtra were well demonstrated. Conference partners SIIs Reaching the unreached, Bajaj Allianz showcasing Digitally connected Health Eco system , Telemedicine goes instant by Practo, Healthlink, Hello Doc were very well presented. Tele Neonatology and Tele Orthopaedics were new Telepractices that were discussed in length. Prof. K. Ganapathy session on NeuroSciences and Tele Stroke with Dr. Madhavan from USA went excellent.

 

Mr. Virender Kumar Chairman DECU – ISRO led the Govt. initiatives in Telemedicine along with Mr. B. S. Bedi, Dr. Supten Sarbhadikari , Mr L.S Satyamurthy and Mr. Gaur Sunder. TCIL’s experience in implementing eHealth projects globally was well expressed and showcased by Mr. A. Sheshagiri Rao. CDAC led by Dr. Hemant Darbari gave future direction of Technology in Healthcare.

 

Over 50 free papers were presented at the conference.

 

Presidential Oration by Prof. K. Selva Kumar took the cake. He vividly explained his journey and milestones in Telemedicine and the audience was awe stuck. All the Past Presidents , members of Exe. Committee from the National and State bodies were extremely helpful and joined hands to make Telemedicon 2017 a great success with support from the Headquarters and dynamic President TSI Prof. K Selva Kumar. A citation was given to Dr. Vijay G. Prabhakar and the two Past Presidents Dr. B. S. Ratta and Dr. B. N. Mohanty.

 

Any omission in the report is not intentional but may be an oversight and the committee seeks pardon. The entire show would not have been possible without the management of Sheraton Grand and event organisers MedVent to whom we are much obliged.

 

Dr. B. S. Ratta.
President
TSI Maharashtra Chapter

The event was inaugurated by the Medical Director Dr. Sanjay Pathare (Ruby Hall Clinic, Pune) in presence of Dr. B.S. Ratta, President TSI Maharashtra Chapter and Exe. committee members of TSI.

 

Dr. B. S. Ratta was the convener of the session and welcomed over 200 delegates from across Maharashtra. The faculty came from all over India and the topics discussed were highly appreciated by the audience. For some it was an inspiring event, while others learnt and few got aware of upcoming things in Healthcare.

 

There were Video Conference presentation from Chennai by Dr. K. Ganapathi & Dr. Nirmal Gupta from Lucknow. Telemedicine Society of India Exe. Members present Dr. B. N. Mohanty, Mr. A. K. Sangal, Mr. Vimal Walhlu, Dr. Pradhan, Dr. Sanjay Sharma, Dr. V.K. Gupta, Dr. Dhanjay Mangal, Mr. S. Raghavan, all spoke on different subjects. Medical Director Dr. Sanjay Pathare from Ruby Hall Clinic spoke on Virtual clinic and Medico Legal aspect in Telemedicine.

 

There were interesting topics like The First Handers, Artificial Intelligence, Neuroscience, Digital Revolution, Tele Follow Ups, Odisha Network, Ped Endocrine etc. Electronic Health Records & Standards with interopretability was presented by Mr. Gaur Sundar from CDAC.

 

Dr. B. S. Ratta.
President
TSI Maharashtra Chapter

MahaTelemedicon 14 this year was held in conjunction with Sparsh Advanced Laparoscopy Center and Bharati Vidyapeeth University Medical College and Hospital , through the aegesis of IMA Sangli. We presented the Journey of Telemedicine in India along with Developing information technology infrastructure for health care.In addition there were sessions on Tele Psychiatry and Mercury Nimbus and its mobile applications .C Snomed was show cased. The programme was accredited by Maharastra Medical Council with 2 credit hours. Over 350 Delegates were registered and spot registrations added another 25 to the list. It was an eye opener on Telemedicine in this part of Maharashtra and enthusiased many to the field. We are following up to make them as new members. We thank IMA Sangli for its whole hearted support in organising the event.CDAC Pune as usual were the spine of the event.Thanks to the team headed by Shailesh Narvaria, Deepankar Dixit, Santosh Nirmal and Deepak Chaudhary. At the Annual GBM of the TSI Maharashtra Chapter following members were unanimously elected as follows for the year 2014-2015.

 

President: Dr. Suparna Telang Vice President : Dr Animish Chavan Secretary : Dr Sangeeta Wagh. Treasurer : Dr B.S.Ratta Exe.Comm: Dr Prachee Sathe Dr Sham Bhosale Dr Ashok Bhanage Dr.Madhuri Lokapur CDAC Rep. Mr Kamal Kashyap

The inaugural conference of The Telemedicine Society of India, Maharashtra Chapter was organized by TSI Maharashtra Chapter jointly with the IMA Pune branch on 1st Sept, 2013 at Dr. Nitu Mandke IMA House Pune. Over 200 delegates attended the Conference.The CME started off with a welcome address by Dr.Prakash Marathe Secretary IMA Pune branch.He called upon Dr Bharati Dhore Patil Immediate Past President IMA and Shri L.S.Satyamurthy President Elect TSI to chair the morning session. Abhijit Gupta opened the session with a demonstration of Praxify. The product generated a lot of interest and enthusiasm amongst the audience.

 

Another novel demonstration Health Risk Assessment (HRA) for lifestyle diseases through Telemedicine was made by Dr.B.S.Ratta.A volunteer from the audience underwent the HRA and his report was received on his mobile phone which was shown to the delegates subsequently. Dr. Ratta showed how this tool could be used to detect early cases of Obesity, Diabetes, Hypertension, increased Lipids and cardiac disorders at an affordable cost by holding mass camps at work site.

 

The conference was inaugurated by Dr. P.K. Sinha Senior Director (R&D) and High Performance Computing) at the Centre for Development of Advanced Computing (C-Dac)Pune, in the presence of Guest of Honour Dr N.K. Dhamija, Deputy Commissioner Training and Nodal Officer Telemedicine , Ministry of Health and Family Welfare(MOH&FW) ,Government of India, New Delhi. The other dignitaries present on the dais for the Lighting of Lamp ceremony were office bearers of Telemedicine Society of India and IMA dignitaries Dr. Prakash Marathe and Dr. Bharati Dhorepatil. Dr P.K Sinha appreciated the role of TSI and spoke on development of cloud computing technology for development of Electronic Health Record (EHR) for every citizen of India linking it to Aadhar cards. With the EHR being central to most health informatics applications, several countries have initiated programs for implementing national EHR infrastructures. Building and implementing such a national EHR infrastructure requires an understanding of healthcare standards, coding systems, and standard frameworks, each of which may vary across borders and/or come from a myriad of sources. He then spoke on Mercury Nimbus- CDAC’s Cloud Enabled EMR/EHR and Telemedicine Suite. In fact Mercury Nimbus was launched in this conference and was well accepted by the audience. Mercury Nimbus was then demonstrated by Gaur Sunder and Praphul Kolte. It consists of three tools; Mercury on Cloud, Cloud Repository and Mercury for Android, specially tailored to cloud/clustered infrastructure. It can be used in Telemedicine scenarios like doctors working in multiple clinics, groups of clinicians working, clinicians at remote end with clinicians at specialist end and HSP-to-HSP interaction.

 

Dr N.K. Dhamija and Dr. S.K. Mishra shared their views on the Central Government initiatives in Telemedicine and healthcare sector including National Medical College Network. Dr. N.K. Dhamija stated that MoH&FW, Govt. of India is laying major emphasis on telemedicine application and there is a huge budget provision for the same to help in bridging the gap between Rural and Urban health divide. He also highlighted the fact that Tele-health Act is on the anvil and National Task Force for standards in Telemedicine will be rejuvenated. Dr. B.N. Mohanty spoke on the Odisha TM Network and it’s functioning in the state of Odisha. He demonstrated how three Government Medical Colleges in the state have taken on all the districts of Odisha to provide medical care through Telemedicine. Dr. Suptendra Nath Sarbadhikari spoke on National Health Portal. He mentioned that it will now be possible for Indian Doctors to upload useful clinical data and interesting medical case reports on the National Health Portal (NHP). This portal is likely to be inaugurated by October,2013.

 

The Afternoon session was chaired by Dr N.K.Dhamija and Dr Suparna Telang. Presentations on Tele-Psychiatry were made by Dr. Suparna Telang and Dr. Animish Chavan. They made a video presentation on use of Tele Psychiatry – SCARF in Chennai. They emphasized that it saves time and money for the patient and the service provider. They discussed various revenue models and a simple software to run a Tele-Psychiatry program. This was followed by a presentation made on Tele Ophthalmology by Dr. Sangeeta Wagh and Dr. Suchetra Kulkarni. Through video-conference with Aravind Eye Hospital of Madurai, they showed how from Ophthalmic camps the images of retina were transferred for opinion to the base hospital and from there treatment offered to the camps. They also made a video presentation on Retinopathy of Prematurity. Mr. B.S. Bedi , Advisor, CDAC and Immediate Past President of TSI spoke on EMR Standardization and it’s Inter-operability. Shri L.S. Satyamurthy, president-elect of TSI and ex-director of Telemedicine, ISRO/Deptt. of Space spoke on telemedicine as a service that can be successfully be adopted for the societal benefits in bringing healthcare to the rural and the under-served population, both in India and in other developing countries. Dr. D.B. Kadam, Professor of Medicine, Sassoon General Hospital and Nodal Officer, Telemedicine (SGH),NRHM(Maharashtra) spoke on how Maharashtra has come on to the Map of Telemedicine. He highlighted the Government Medical College Network and showcased the TM program at Sassoon General Hospital. This was well appreciated by one and all.

 

In the concluding session convenor Dr B.S.Ratta proposed vote of thanks.