Medica Superspeciality Hospital alongwith the Bengal Chamber of Commerce and Industry recently organized a 4-day Health Tech conference that brought all recent developments and in medical technology on one platform.

Healthcare is embracing rapid digitisation and thanks to medical apps, video conferencing, Internet of Things (IoT) and other such technologies, it is possible to navigate this situation and bring healthcare to the doorstep of everyone. There are a plethora of apps available where one can post medical queries, upload medical reports and test results and get advice from qualified doctors, and this is just one of the many examples that show how healthcare and technology are quickly merging together.

In this background, the Bengal Chamber of Commerce and Industry, in association with Medica Superspeciality Hospital, organised Health Tech, a four-day conference, bringing technologies applicable in healthcare industry together on one platform. The various themes on which the seminar focused were - Technology that is driving the future of healthcare sector, Entrepreneurships in Health Tech and New Technologies for high-end delivery. The conference ended on 12 March. 

One of the highlights was the release of a PricewaterhouseCoopers thought paper on “Reimagining the possible in the Indian healthcare ecosystem with emerging technologies”. The objective of this programme was to bring all stakeholders in the healthcare sector under one roof to exchange ideas and best practices as it emerges in a continuously evolving environment, said Dr. Alok Roy, past president, The Bengal Chamber of Commerce and Industry, and Chairman, Medica Group of Hospitals. 

'The Health Tech programme is an exceptional platform for networking and taking business collaboration forward with global partners. Technology is changing every day. What is in vogue today may become obsolete soon; so design and technology together can shape the future for the industry players,' Dr. Roy said. Medica was also the co-organiser of this programme.

'The cooperation between technology and people can produce amazing achievements and help us push the barriers of medical science. Digital technology in medicine and healthcare can transform unsustainable healthcare systems into sustainable ones, equalize the relationship between medical professionals and patients, make medical services cheaper and faster, and provide effective solutions and overcome the struggle to cope with deadly diseases like cancer, AIDS or Ebola, and gradually give rise to healthier citizens in healthier ecosystems,' Dr Roy explained. 

The scope of West Bengal being the preferred destination for healthcare stakeholders was addressed by Mr. Moloy Banerjee, Managing Director, Linde India Limited. Overseas perspective was addressed by Mr Archil Dzuliashvili, Ambassador of Georgia, followed by speeches from the dignitaries from various countries like the Kingdom of Thailand, the Federal Democratic Republic of Nepal, the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka and the People’s Republic of Bangladesh and Trade Commissioner, Canadian High Commission. 

“The Chamber has always endeavoured to connect technology end users with developers in co-creating better environment and enabling an ecosystem with better enterprise planning, easier manufacturing process, and faster services at lesser costs. Above all, the Chamber acts as a co-player with state government as a promoter and facilitator of West Bengal as business destination”, said Mr. Arnab Basu, Chairperson, IT Committee, The Bengal Chamber and Partner and Technology Consulting Leader, PricewaterhouseCoopers.