IfG.CC -
Institute for eGovernment

The new service is aimed at taking healthcare services to the 3-4 million people living in remote habitations in the state and who are out of reach of existing services, said Balaji Utla, CEO, HMRI.

Once established, the system would be replicated in six other states in the country, depending on the need and feasibility, he said in an interaction with reporters here today.

"I would hold consultations with domestic and international experts on how to improve the health system in our country," Harsh Vardhan said after taking charge of the health and family welfare ministry at the Nirman Bhavan.

The medical colleges will work as resource centres and government hospitals will be attached to them. Besides, special facilities for treatment of heart diseases, cancer and other serious ailments would also be developed at medical colleges. Another benefit of this network will be tele-continuing medical education (CME) under the project which is to be launched soon.

“Ministry intends to set up a mechanism to monitor and evaluate implementation of and adherence to EHR standards and guidelines by various healthcare practitioners and vendors, thus we need to have an e-health authority which will be the regulator and which will see that EHR standards are being adhered to,” said Mr Verma while inaugurating an ASSOCHAM national summit on ‘ICT in Healthcare: Changing Dimensions of Healthcare in India.’

The Union Health Ministry will soon establish National Medical College Network (NMCN) in which all government medical colleges will be interlinked to create a national task force on tele-medicine to address the problem of scarcity of doctors in rural India.

In the first phase, 41 government medical institutions will be interlinked to enhance the technical education skills and provide outreach services or tertiary care services to peripheral health facilites.

Healthcare companies are increasingly using technology to connect patients and their families with experts on their panels via online portals they have set up. But getting a second opinion is only one of a host of we-based healthcare and medical services that are now available online. Portals like navayush.com save your diagnostic reports online, help you order your medicines, offer personalised health coaching, monitor your health parameters such as blood sugar levels and even send you alerts and reminders about your medication.

Most discussions on Indian healthcare invariably reveal the elephant in the room and bring home the reality that there are still two Indias. Even more paradoxical may be the fact that while India and its brilliant minds are powering the technology revolution throughout the world, large percentages of our population remain untouched by digital, and were it not for the vision of initiatives like NITI Aayog, might have been left behind.

In 2016, the government called on all of us – healthcare providers, technologists, and media specialists – all stakeholders who could help expedite and promote the widest possible digitization of our nation and the onboarding of hundreds of millions of Indian citizens into the “cadres of the connected”.

The Cyberabad Digital Health Declaration said the industry will strive to make eHealth an integral part of the healthcare delivery system.

The declaration has come at the second day of two international healthcare meets on IT in healthcare and patient safety.

With vast amounts of medical data generated each year, many small and medium-sized healthcare enterprises are opting for cloud technology to store, access and share data, to reduce operational costs and increase efficiency.

Unlike large super-speciality hospitals that have in-house technology for managing data, SMEs in the healthcare space – mainly 25-50-bed hospitals – are opting for cloud technology.

People living in Jammu, Srinagar, Ladakh, and Katra would be able to avail the benefits of the high-speed broadband internet service.

Jammu and Kashmir Deputy Chief Minister Nirmal Singh today launched a high-speed broadband internet service in the state as part of initiatives under the Digital India programme of the Central government. People living in Jammu, Srinagar, Ladakh, and Katra would be able to avail the benefits of the service. During the launch, Singh said: "By improving digital connectivity and improving digital literacy in the country, we will be able to promote inclusive growth that covers electronic services, products, devices and job opportunities."

The hike in the service tax rate in the Union Budget for 2015–16 from 12.36 to 14 will impact online buyers.

The hike may be passed on to the customers, which will result in a higher rate while shopping online.

Praveen Sinha, founder and MD, Jabong.com, said, “The government’s decision to hike service tax rate is a disappointing move.”

Deputy commissioner Dinesh Malhotra said e-stamp papers of `10 and `20 denomination would now be available at Sugam centre. “This will help ease long queues at stamp vendors and will benefit commoners,” said Malhotra.

Elaborating, he said e-tracking system has been introduced in four important wings and departments located in the DC office complex. “This system will further be introduced in food supplies and other developmental departments to improve functioning of these departments,” he said.

The State of Himachal Pradesh was awarded two CSI-Nihilent e-Governance awards 2014-15. The Award of Appreciation was conferred upon “HIMKOSH” Integrated Financial Management System Department of Finance Govt. of Himachal Pradesh and Award of Recognition” upon “HIMBHOOMI” Integrated Land Records Computerization Govt. of Himachal Pradesh on 3rd December, 2015 at New Delhi. The awards were received by D.D. Sharma, Special Secretary Finance -cum-Director, Treasuries, Accounts & Lotteries & Revenue- Disaster Management Himachal Pradesh Government. Shri Arun Ojha, Deputy Director, Treasuries, Accounts & Lotteries, H.P. was also present.

Chief Minister congratulated the Department of Excise and Taxation for providing information technology enabled services to the tax payers of the State. He said that the e-enabled services were the need of the hour and with the launching of e-CST service, dealers would be getting statutory forms essential to avail concessions on inter-state trade, anywhere and at any time round the clock through internet services.

Under Smart City Mission, 229 CCTV cameras have been installed at prominent places in the city, out of which seven sites have been installed under the Intelligent Traffic Management System

Chief minister Sukhwinder Singh Sukhu on Wednesday virtually inaugurated an integrated command, control and crime response centre (ICCC) located at the superintendent of police (SP) office in Dharamshala under the Smart City Mission.

Awarded for its e-governance project in December, 2015, Himachal Pradesh actually is lagging in connecting up its much of its rural panchayats with optical fiber networks to enable delivering better government to citizen services at their doorsteps.

National Optical Fibre Network (NOFN) December 6, 2015 data shows that only 14 panchayats in Himachal Pradesh are connected with an opitcal fiber network.

Himachal Pradesh Officials have taken action to reduce traffic pollution by encouraging e-vehicles since farming communities there are among the most sensitive to climate change. According to scientific studies, the growing number of tourists and car exhaust gases are harming the high Himalayan ecosystems' eco-system. These heat-absorbing contaminants accelerate glacier melting.

In a green push, the state transport department this month became the first in the country to switch its entire fleet of petrol and diesel official vehicles to electric ones. As per the plan, all government departments will be equipped with electric vehicles within a year for a sustainable and cost-efficient system.

He said that the technological advancements needed to be utilized in prompt delivery of services to the common man at their door steps without wasting their time and money. He said that in the present day context keeping pace with the global technology was need of the hour for the progress of any society. He said that the State was promoting IT penetration to provide efficient Government to Citizen (G2C) services to the people besides creating a strong e-Governance Network by setting up core infrastructure facilities for all government departments running e-Governance applications, consolidation of data at single location in a secured manner and enabling online delivery of services at the doorsteps of the citizens. He said that the State Government would be exploring possibilities of enrolling all the students in schools of ninth and matric standard so that readily available data was prepared for holding Board examinations. He said that efforts needed to be made to help examinees submit their examination forms electronically as also email their examination roll numbers.

Congratulating the Department of Information Technology for adding more milestones into the efficient delivery system by taking benefit of e-enabled facilities in making the administration efficient, transparent and accountable towards the general public, Chief Minister said that the State Government was laying added emphasis upon the re-engineering of official processes and usage of information technology for delivery of efficient services to the people. He said that with the availability of the e-enabled services people would now be able to apply for any service and procurement of documents on line thereby saving their time and money in the existing lengthy official procedure.