The Indian Healthcare Industry has grown in leaps and bounds in the last couple of years. The focus is on affordable quality healthcare closer to the point of care to avoid stress on the existing setup. Furthermore, to ensure that quality healthcare is available to the masses, even in remote areas, there has been a massive push on telemedicine and mHealth.
Diagnostics are the first line of defence in healthcare. Accurate ailment detection is the foundation for deciding the proper treatment, surgery, and medication or therapeutic course. Over 70 percent of the therapeutic and surgical decisions are based on diagnostics. In the past 20 years, there has been a movement of sorts with technology & digital innovations driving the diagnostics industry.
Diagnostics serve a primary function in promoting health and quality of life. Accessibility, cost-effectiveness, and use of excellent & quality diagnostics are integral to high-quality health care. Accurate diagnostics are critical for the proper management of diseases. It leads to better patient care & clinical outcomes and drives increased affordability by reducing overall therapeutic costs. Indian diagnostics manufacturers are putting all efforts towards making them accessible even in the country’s remotest corners. The Indian diagnostics and medical devices industry have been at the center stage of the Indian healthcare industry, driving innovations with an extremely pro-people mindset. During the pandemic, telehealth became the most potent disruptive innovation in healthcare.
iQuant
All four modalities of telehealth – live video conferencing, store-and-forward, remote patient monitoring, and mHealth played a crucial part in ensuring the availability of reliable healthcare. Especially in the early days of the pandemic, healthcare providers offered telehealth for patients by any means necessary — some simply falling back to standalone Zoom meetings to provide video visits until they could adopt and implement more integrated solutions.
Diagnostics is driving a silent healthcare transformation making it genuinely inclusive. Diagnostics and Medical Devices manufacturers are bringing rural India into the mainstream by introducing affordable and accessible preventive healthcare and diagnostics solutions at their disposal. Quality diagnostics services are now available to urban and rural folks – various developments have taken place to ensure that the distance between patients and point-of-care (POC) declines. The rising proximity of medical devices to the point-of-care catalyses overall healthcare costs reduction.
At J Mitra, we are very keen on bridging the testing–patient divide. Our R&D team continuously keeps on innovating on this front. We constantly embrace the latest technologies to detect and diagnose various ailments and create unique, small-footprint, cost-effective, and mobile solutions.
To this effect, the iQuant immunoassay analyser – India’s first portable diagnostics solution has been indigenously developed by J Mitra and aggressively promoted. IQuant has been developed in collaboration with IIT Madras’ HTIC (Healthcare Technology Innovation Centre).
- 11 individual tests
- Works on battery power – Portable
- Can be carried in a bag for non-road locations
- Trained technician not required
- Test results within 10–30 mins
- Economical & viable solution
- Ideal for a low-resource setting
It is a state-of-the-art Fluorescence Immunoassay Analyser for quantitative and qualitative blood test parameters, especially in rural resource-scarce settings. This solution has the capabilities to conduct eleven separate Diagnostics tests – Dengue NS1, Dengue IgM, Dengue IgG, HbA1c, TSH, T3, T4, Vitamin B12, Vitamin D, PCT, and CRP, and this has been a great hit. These highly-active and sought-after diagnostic solutions are now available across the country and in the remotest of locations. J Mitra continues to add to the number of diagnostic solutions available as a software upgrade on the cloud. iQuant is an innovative MedTech offering – on the product side, it mixes science, IT, healthcare, and research. In contrast, on the implementation side, it is an excellent combination of social conditions, ground realities coupled with business sense. iQuant is an innovative, path-breaking product that significantly influences the detection and diagnostic process.
iQuant is an innovative home-grown product. It is the most cost-effective solution and portable device available in the market today. It can be carried easily and has a self-sufficient power supply, making it ideal for Indian conditions, especially in remote and electricity-dark areas. Performing these wide varieties of tests generally requires more than one instrument in any laboratory. However, with the iQuant analyser, it is possible to perform all these tests on a single machine. The analyser is equipped with state-of-the-art fluorescence immunoassay technology. It has unique features like high-end processors, ergonomic design, inbuilt memory that stores up to 1-lac patients’ data, 10-inches colour display, Bluetooth for wireless printing, wi-fi connectivity for online support, iCloud facility for up-gradation of software and training, 1-hour battery back-up in case of a power failure and effortless portability owing to its lightweight of approx. 2 kgs.
The Quanti range test kits used with the iQuant analyser are high-volume builders for the laboratories.
iQuant’s FIA technology offers ease of use of rapid tests and sensitivities far better than other conventional test methods like ELISA. Each test cartridge is precision engineered and manufactured using robotic technology. No batch-specific calibrations are required as each kit is embedded with the data on QR codes present on each test cartridge. J Mitra has launched these kits on advanced FIA (Fluorescence immunoassay) technology with accurate results and at very affordable prices.
The absence of low-cost medical instruments often renders local medical facilities incapable of providing quick test reports and medications to patients. But the scenario is steadily changing. Collectively, the diagnostics – MedTech industry will catalyse a higher quality of healthcare for rural India, in line with the government’s Healthcare-for-All initiative.
Authored By:
Jatin Mahajan, Managing Director at J Mitra & Co Pvt Ltd
About J. Mitra & Co. Pvt. Ltd.
J Mitra & Company is India’s leading in-vitro diagnostics manufacturing company. The Company focuses on preserving human lives, by promoting healthcare through technology and innovation.
Incorporated in 1969, this research-based biotechnology company has completed 51 years of its mission to serve mankind. Apart from a pan-India footprint, J Mitra & Company are also one of the biggest exporter of diagnostics kits from India, and export to more than 45 countries across the entire globe.
J Mitra & Company is the pioneer in manufacturing and marketing of IVD test kits in India. It is the tradition of quality and seriousness of purpose that has led to its sterling and harmonious growth and an enviable recognition that extended far beyond its frontiers. The company manufactures a range of tests for infectious diseases like HIV, HBV, HCV, Dengue, Malaria, Typhoid, Leptospira in rapid and ELISA test formats. Their other products include a range of anti-Sera products and confirmatory tests like Western Blot for HIV
Some of the Company’s Industry Firsts
- Maximum patents in India – more than 55 patents
- First Indian Company to get drug manufacturing licenses for critical tests in both rapid and Elisa formats like HIV, HBV, HCV
- Introduced the technology of differential detection of HIV 1 and HIV 2 in single rapid kit format, a product which still is the market leader after two decades.
- Dengue Day 1 test (world-class IVD product) retains no. 1 market share even 12 years after its launch in 2010
Certifications
- The company being fully conscious of its responsibility has adopted best industry practices. Its large-scale automation not only improves the quality of kits but also meets the bulk requirements of the customers. J. Mitra facility is
- TUV SUD Certification
- ISO 9001:2015
- EN ISO 13485:2016
