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medical technology, the key to the technology’ s success lies in its actual utilisation. Our attempt is to educate women about the latest screening and diagnostic tools at their disposal, so that the highend equipment is put to good use, eventually improving both longevity and quality of life.
Take mammography for example, we have the world’ s most advanced system at our centre, but it is useless unless women come in and use it. It is recommended that all ladies above the age of 40 get a mammogram done once every 2 years, but either because of the taboo associated with breast cancer, or extremely busy schedules, no one takes out even a few minutes for this simple test.
There is lot of talk about make in India. Do you see the rise of manufacturing in medical technology space as well?
India is doing much in diagnostics and robotic technology. The medical tourism has got a boost due to low cost treatment options. Was a part of the committee to start manufacturing CT scans. The Task Force is overseeing the development of a 1.5 tesla magnetic resonance imaging( MRI) machine, SAMIR at the Indian Institute of Technology( IIT), Mumbai within five-year timeline. The
I am not saying that the natural medicine practitioners could do surgery but they can play a role in spreading the word around if involved. Rather than ignoring or sidelining, it is best to utilize their vast network.
one and half years have already gone into it and I hope it will get completed on time.
We have a lot of Indian CT scanners, so are the x-ray machines. As far as completely Indian machines, the assembling of machines will continue to happen even if we manufacture some parts here. It’ s a joint process and various destinations are chosen based on cost and expertise.
We have started our efforts but need to catch up. Government is working towards it and it will take some time for a change in thought process.
Most of the machines we see are imported ones. Will we see the startups or Indian firms who expand into an indigenous industry?
The startups in the highend technology are fewer or even negligent. Reason is the huge investment into infrastructure and brains. At the moment, we have to rely on the imported technologies. In case there is a huge funding push or a sustainable startup policy, we can certainly do well. We have the best skilled people around.
Have we been able to reach out to the rural areas? How do we make the technologies affordable?
We have to remember that the healthcare is a state subject in India and most of the implementation of
12 BioVoiceNews | March 2017