Aimed at giving a major boost to the health sector, the government is planning to launch a dedicated satellite, HEALTHSAT, with an investment of over Rs 400-crore to beam health related programmes through Doordarshan. It will be mandatory for all cable operators to air these health channels.
The ministry of health has sought the views of the Planning Commission on the proposal to launch a dedicated medium weight class communication satellite, which would have the capability to meet broadband connectivity requirements for various requirements of the National Grid.
The present cost of a standard telemedicine node including computer hardware/software and video conferencing system is around Rs 4,00,000 at the district hospital level.
The proposed health channel from Doordarshan will telecast educational programmes for under-graduate and post-graduate students, pursuing different courses in medicine and medical practitioners. It would also have slots for news along with slots for programmes like disease forecast and live out patient department (OPD).
These would be 30 minutes progammes and the channel would be on air for 12 hours every day of the month. The total cost for airing the channel annually has been worked out at Rs 172 crore.
The DD-Health channel will be an extension of similar projects undertaken by the Prasar Bharati in the past including its ongoing narrowcast transmission of agriculture series across various districts.
The government also plans to launch a national health website covering various aspects like standard treatment protocol and links to other health websites. This is projected to cost Rs 5 crore.
The health ministry is also working on a plan to ensure that all tele-medicine network evolve around a national tele-medicine grid.