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V. Rishi Kumar

Currently, Cognizant addresses the three key drivers in the healthcare industry — which encompasses quality care, administrative efficiencies and compliance and provides the entire range of solutions to all the players.

HYDERABAD, Dec. 30

CONGNIZANT Technology Solutionsis bullish on the growing healthcare practice. The company is in the process of broadbasing and expanding its range of services for the global marketplace, including providing certain back-office services to its clientele.

The Vice-President, Healthcare and Life Sciences Practice, Cognizant, Mr Mohan Narayanan, told Business Line that the global healthcare market is resurgent now and is estimated to be $4 trillion of which IT spend is about $68 billion. This is growing at a CAGR of 13.2 per cent as per Gartner report.

This offers a huge opportunity for solutions provider like Cognizant whose 23 per cent revenue accrued from the healthcare practice this year.

Currently, Cognizant addresses the three key drivers in the healthcare industry — which encompasses quality care, administrative efficiencies and compliance and provides the entire range of solutions to all the players — payers, providers and pharmaceutical companies. ``We bring our deep domain expertise in this space and combine our technological strengths to this huge business space,'' he explained.

Though after the initial emphasis on the healthcare related compliance issues, there was a prolonged period of lull. With the US Federal regulations stipulating the need to bring in higher compliance and Hippa norms, and the industry players seeking efficiencies in the adoption of the best practices in the healthcare, ``we are witnessing a gradual boom,'' he said.

The company, which is currently providing solutions to integrate the clinical and administrative systems for better co-ordination of care, and e-prescription solution for minimising errors in medication, was also working on case management systems to manage chronic illnesses and outcome research solutions to identify trends in health delivery and management that would further enhance the quality of care in the healthcare system.

``Perhaps, we are the only company in India, which is focussed on the healthcare industry having such a broad spectrum of solutions and services. Though we have not yet tapped the potential in the Indian healthcare and pharma sector, we are now in parleys with several major pharmaceutical companies both `desi' and those with multinational companies, which have presence here, to offer our solutions,'' Mr Narayanan said.

One of the big areas of growth is the need to cut down on administrative efficiencies. It is estimated that about $ 250 billion is spent in the US on medical claims paperwork. With the players in the healthcare chain — covering doctors, pharma companies, insurance segment — are all now in the process of addressing this problem.

The effort is also to cut down on time to process claims. Therefore, Cognizant offers solutions that include e-connectivity that would help in eliminating paper in key business processes, while extending workflow solutions that enhance productivity and efficiency in claims adjudication, referral and authorisations.

This also includes data analytical solutions to track trends in utilisation. Within these complex systems, revenue cycle management is one of the solutions that helps improve the claims realisation rate — providers to payers — that is estimated at as low as 45 per cent, Mr Narayanan explained.

``One of the areas where we are currently focused is to partner pharmaceutical companies in their endeavour to cut down time for clinical trials in drug discovery lifecycle. We provide clinical technology tools covering Stage 1 to 4 cycles. Alongside, we provide technology for research and development for these major pharma companies, which are constantly seeking to bring down the process of time to market for various drugs,'' Mr Narayanan said.

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