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Success Story
A USAID-supported
“telemedicine” program
provides electronic access
to specialized healthcare
for thousands of rural
Pakistanis
Saving Lives Online in Pakistan
Photo: PAIMAN
A physician at Holy Family Hospital
consults with sick rural Pakistani children
like Fauzia from a remote location thanks
to a USAID-supported telemedicine
project that can be duplicated across the
country.
“This technology lets us
reach out to the people
previously without access
to an ordinary doctor, much
less a hospital specialist. It
represents a tremendous
improvement in their quality
of life,” said Dr. Asif Zafar
Malik.
Occasional illness is a natural part of growing up, but nine-yearold
Fauzia was miserable most all of the time. Recurring ear and
throat pain led her worried parents to take the girl to a nearby
health clinic in Attock, a district capital in Pakistan’s Punjab
province.
During the consultation, a specialist diagnosed an acute case of
tonsillitis, and scheduled surgery to remove her tonsils at
Holy Family Hospital in Rawalpindi, about 50 miles away
from the clinic. Following the successful operation, Fauzia
went back to the clinic for follow-up appointments, and was
soon happy and healthy again.
What made Fauzia’s treatment unique was that her
diagnosis and post-surgery consultations all took place
using the new technique of telemedicine. Through an online
computer, she was able to receive care from a hospital
specialist literally miles away using technology so advanced
that her doctor could diagnose her condition within minutes.
With USAID support, Holy Family Hospital is pioneering
telemedicine – healthcare services through information and
communications technologies such as videoconferencing.
Holy Family serves as a hub where specialists from the hospital
consult in real time with patients who visit one of eight established
telemedicine sites in rural clinics in Punjab and Sindh provinces.
“This project laid the foundation for a national telemedicine
network in Pakistan,” said Dr. Asif Zafar Malik, Holy Family’s
project director for telemedicine. “Our collaboration with USAID
led to new programs at both federal and provincial levels. We had
the vision, but the pilot project really helped us demonstrate to
patients and policy makers alike that this is the way to go.”
Telemedicine carries enormous promise in a country where the
ratio of patients to doctors is a high 1,400-to-1, and the cost and
diffi culty of travel to and from health clinics is challenging for rural
Pakistanis.
Holy Family staff now shares its experience of having conducted
more than 2,000 telemedicine consultations with medical
personnel nationwide through courses in e-health and other
applications of telemedicine, which have trained more than
100 doctors and nurses who have gone on to set up additional
telemedicine centers at other hospitals.
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