MillionICU, an initiative by Dozee, that addresses the massive shortage of ICU beds and staff in public hospitals, will help facilitate critical care for 900+ patients over the next 3 months at the Lok Nayak Hospital (LNH) in New Delhi. Currently, LNH has upgraded 50 beds with AI-powered contactless Dozee monitors in ICUs for remote, central and continuous monitoring of COVID-19 patients. Fifty more such beds are proposed to be added to aid the treatment of post-covid Mucormycosis patients. Dozee has also set up a Patient Monitoring Cell in the hospital to ensure 24*7 support. The upgradation of facilities at LNh was sponsored by The State Bank of India Foundation and Huawei with C-Camp as key coordinator.

The MillionICU initiative aims to enable public hospitals to tide over the current COVID-19 crisis in the short-term and bring about a rapid, long-term transformation in India’s public healthcare infrastructure. The initiative aims to dramatically increase the number of HDUs with centralized patient monitoring in these hospitals and make critical care more easily accessible and available to the needy, even in the remotest part of the country. Under the initiative, hospital beds are installed with Dozee’s contactless sensor featuring an AI-powered triaging system that enables continuous (more than 100 times per hour) and accurate monitoring of a patient’s heart rate, respiratory rate, and other clinical parameters like sleep apnea and myocardial performance metrics, without coming in contact with the patient. The constant stream of patient data aids the medical staff with early detection of patient deterioration and notifies the care team of any abnormalities before it becomes critical. Custom alerts can be set for every patient, helping doctors optimise treatment plans, focus on deteriorating patients and provide improved proactive care. The Patient Monitoring Cell enabled by Dozee helps keep track of all the patients and alerts the doctors and nurses on any escalation in the wards.

Several private & public hospitals in the capital are in the process of onboarding Dozee to remotely monitor patients in COVID wards. The second surge of the COVID-19 pandemic has put tremendous pressure on the healthcare system of the country. According to official data, as of May 2021 there are only 4,798 ICU beds in government hospitals for Covid-19 patients. Additionally, India has around 9.26 lakh doctors and less than 20,000 of these are trained in pulmonology, anaesthesiology, critical care and emergency medicine. According to experts and doctors, to battle the COVID-19 pandemic, India will need an extra 500,000 ICU beds and many more trained nurses and doctors.

Dozee’s MillionICU initiative is a bold step towards changing the critical care infrastructure throughout the country. It offers an unique opportunity for government hospitals to use technology to quickly augment the much required ICUs & HDUs. India needs innovative solutions that are low-cost yet effective in order to upgrade the medical infrastructure to meet the demands of the already large and growing population. The MillionICU initiative answers to this urgent need of strengthening the long term health infrastructure and making quality healthcare available, accessible and affordable to the vast majority of the population.