Spurred by a phenomenal boost in the medical tourism industry — poised to touch the $2 billion mark in India by 2012, according to a joint report by McKinsey and the Confederation of Indian Industry — a number of premier healthcare institutes are now vying for international accreditations to give themselves a global appeal. To cater to the surge in demand are a basket of accrediting bodies, prominent among which are the Joint Commission International (JCI) and ISO 9001:2000, which is the generic standard for Quality Management System across the world.
So far, two Indian healthcare chains — Apollo and Wockhardt — have been granted the Joint Commission International (JCI) Accreditation, catapulting them into an exclusive league of 71 international hospitals, such as Harvard Medical and Massachusetts General, to have cut the grade.
In fact, most Indian hospitals seem to be vying for either ISO accreditations or the JCI, as other reputed ones like the Australian Council on Healthcare Standards and the Malaysian Society for Quality in Healthcare primarily grant recognition to hospitals in their own country.
While most hospitals may be opting for such accreditations to boost their outpatient revenue, the biggest beneficiaries would be domestic patients. “For instance, most of these accreditations prescribe detailed parameters on quality standards, benchmarks, metrics and compliance norms, ensuring gold-standard quality,” says Bali.
However, most experts feel that India would have to pull up its socks quickly and formulate stringent domestic healthcare guidelines. “Else, countries like Thailand and Malaysia with international healthcare standards would capture the market,” warns Maini.
http://www.indianexpress.com/story/12890.html
You must be logged in to post a comment.
