I want to thank The Timesof India for this initiativeand the decision to enterthis field and for pickingthe focus and categoriesthat they have chosen. It isa pleasure to be hereamongst all of you who areamongst the best in yourrespective fields.We allknow that health is wealthand that medical servicesare the one constant re-quired by all of us at someor the other point in our lives; whether for ourselves di-rectly or indirectly when the services are needed bymembers of family or friends or colleagues.When wego to hospitals we literally look to our doctors as if theyare gods and we fully expect them to perform miraclesand save the life and limb of our loved one.And evenwhen the outcome is not a happy one we accept it asfate because we know that the doctors have done thebest that they could and the outcome is despite theirbest efforts.The point is that we go to hospitals with alot of hope and expectations that centre on the medicalstaff.Clearly, the role of the doctor in our lives is notonly important but near miraculous.The standards of care and service provided by themedical sector in the private sector is what is causingpeople to flock to these service providers and centres.

And I am happy to note that. As for doctors,whether they work in the public or the privatesector, they display equal commitment. It is a

hallmark of the profession that doctors rarely havetime for a personal life.They are available for their pa-tients at all hours of the day and night. And for this levelof commitment and concern one cannot but thank you.Today’s awards aim to recognise and reward bestpractises and I thank all of the winners and the nomi-nees for their excellence and for the excellence of thecare they have provided.

Ram Vilas Paswan; Union Minister of Consumer Affairs, Food & Public Distribution

Nilakshi.Sharma@timesgroup.com

The healthcare sector in India has grownexponentially over the course of the lastdecade. This robust growth has been

made possible by a variety of factors, whichinclude changing consumer expectations, in-creasing health awareness. Unfortunately thedisease burden in India is also on the rise, es-pecially when it comes to the lifestyle diseasetrio – Diabetes, Hypertension and Cardio-

Vascular Diseases. The last decade has wit-nessed an increasing demand in not just dis-ease management of these lifestyle relatedhealth issues, as opposed tothe traditional notion ofcures; but has also witnesseda tremendous change in thetype and standard of health-care services that are beingincreasingly demanded by pa-tients. The response of theprivate healthcare sector hasbeen exponential growth andtrying its very best to keeppace with the consumer ex-pectation.

Acknowledging the vitality and growth ofthe sector and its increasing focus on patientcare, The Times of India has initiated TheHealthcare Achiever's Awards in associationwith New India Assurance, one of India's pre-mium healthcare providers to create a plat-form where the achievements of the health-care sector can be recognised andacknowledged. The inaugural awards cere-mony was hosted recently in Delhi. The plat-form brings together the best of the health-care fraternity at the level of individuals whoare redefining the field and hospitals and or-ganisations that are setting the standards and

becoming examples. The selection wasthrough a combination – in two categories thewinners were based on jury selection. In the

other two categories the win-ners were selected through aprocess based upon a combi-nation of surveys and jury se-lection in accordance withthe process as laid out by ourprocess advisors Ernst &Young. The combined infor-mation of factual data, doc-tor feedback and patient sur-vey were put forth to the juryfor tabulation to shortlist thewinner in each category.

Based on the jury presentation it was clearthat the jury had burnt much midnight oil asthey shortlisted the winners from what wasan unexpectedly enthusiastic and therefore,huge response. The official tabulation washandled by Ernst & Young, India and if theirpresentation was any indication, it was a pre-cise and structured process that ensured fair-ness and transparency in the tabulationprocess.

The award night was a glittering event thatsaw representatives from various hospitalsand healthcare organisations across Indiagather under one roof. Ram Vilas Paswan,

Union Minister of Consumer Affairs, Food &Public Distribution, graced the occasion asthe chief guest while the Secretary, Ministry ofHealth & Family Welfare, Lov Verma, clearlysupported the initiative with not just his pres-ence but his gracious words of en-couragement to the healthcareproviders. Also gracing theoccasion was G. Srinivasan,the Chairman and ManagingDirector of New IndiaAssurance. Bipasha Basu,the goodwill ambassador ofhealth and fitness, spokeon what we as individu-als could do to remainfit and healthy.

But perhaps themost spectacularpart of the eveningwas witnessing theconnection that doc-tors, administratorsand representativesfrom different hos-pitals and healthcareorganisations aroundthe country formed withone another through theevening.

While it is vital to focus on thegood work that has been doneacross categories, it is equally

important to acknowledge the impor-tance of ‘Thought Leaders’. Becausethese are the people and the organisa-tions which create innovative, compas-sionate and workable out-of-the-boxmodels in the healthcare eco-system. Inthe process they have impacted thou-sands of lives for the better.

MOST INSPIRING HEALTHCARELEADER OF THE YEAR

The ‘Most InspiringHealthcare Leaderof the Year’ thisyear is Dr.Thulasiraj Ravilla,Executive Director,LAICO, Aravind EyeCare System. Hehas been a part ofthe leadershipteam that builtAravind Eye careSystem into theworld’s largest eyecare provider. It is

also known for its sustainable, scalableand replicable model of service deliveryto all rich and poor.

He brought in the management compe-tence to the organization through effec-tive systems and processes. He was theSouth East Asia’s Regional Chair for theInternational Agency for the Preventionof Blindness and was the founderPresident of Vision 2020 The Right toSight: India. He has also been listedamong the 30 Most Influential People inPublic Health.

RISING STAR OF THE YEARThis award acknowl-edges the vision andpassion of VikramVupalla, Founder &CEO, India’s largestdialysis network –NephroPlus. Afterspending 10 years inthe US healthcare in-dustry, his passion toredefine healthcaredelivery in Indiaprompted him tofound NephroPlus inDec 2009. He has expanded NephroPlus toIndia’s largest dialysis network of 33 cen-ters across 10 states and continues to growtowards the plan of 150 centers by 2017 tobecome the largest network in Asia.

BEST HEALTHCAREINITIATIVE FOR SOCIAL GOODThis award goes toMaharogi SewaSamiti, Warora,Anandwan. The or-ganization, foundedby Baba Amte in1949, has beenworking relentlesslytowards the better-ment of stigmatizedand marginalizedpeople such as thoseafflicted with lep-rosy, the hearing andspeech impaired,the visually chal-lenged, the orthopedically challenged andthe socially and economically backwardrural and tribal populace.

I want to congratulate everyone here be-cause what they do is stupendous.But as acrusader of health and fitness I want to saythat we need to change our lifestyles and re-alise that looking after bodies is somethingthat we need to do for ourselves. Being fitwill only increase our efficiency in all aspectsof our life.We should not forget that health isthe most precious bit of wealth we have.

Bipasha Basu,Actress

Thought Leaders

The Awards were grouped underdifferent categories and the juryhad a busy task ahead of them in

sifting and selecting the eventual win-ners. The process of selection took

into account the different criteria foreach of the categories.

Practice leaders: The winners in thepractice leader category were based

on a doctor patient research method-ology where over 1000 patients, caregivers and GPs and Specialists wereinterviewed. The research was basedon critical attributes of care deliveryfrom a patient's perspective, and thewinners were declared for the follow-ing sub categories:

● Single Specialty Hospitals - 4Specialties (Orthopedics, Oncology,Cardiology & Neurology) - Pan India(Top 8 metros).

● Multispecialty Hospitals - Metrowise (Top 8 metros).

● Best Hospital in Secondary Care;Zone wise - 4 Zones (North, South,East & West).

Encouraging Innovation & SettingStandards: There were 6 Awards un-der this Innovations and SettingStandards of Care Delivery categorythat were open for all hospitals acrossvarious segments.

● Innovations in managing longterm conditions

● Innovations in patient diagnostics

● Empowering the healthcare in-dustry with technology

● Innovation in quality of servicedelivery

● Customer service excellence● Patient wellbeing and quality careTo determine the winners for these

six Awards, more than 140 hospitalsvied for the 6 Awards in the category.After the first round of screening, allthe valid entries were put in front of aScreening Jury who determined thetop three finalists in each category.The finalists were then called for an in-person presentation to the Final Jurypanel following which the winnerswere declared. The process was vali-dated and tabulated by Ernst & Young,the process partners for the Awards

Recognizing the thought leaders: Inthis category the contenders werebased upon jury nominations. Winnerswere selected based on unanimousconsensus.

● Most Inspiring healthcare leader● Rising star award● Social NGO group

HONOURING HEALTHCAREPROVIDERS The aim of these awards is to recognise the improvement and better

standards of care that healthcare providers are now focusing on

Dr. Thulasiraj Ravilla,Executive Director,LAICO, Aravind Eye

Care System

Vikram Vuppala,Founder & CEO,

NephroPlus

Dr. Sheetal Amte,Chief DevelopmentOfficer, Maharogi

Sewa Samiti, Warora(Anandwan)

Catch the coverage of the ET Healthcare Achievers Awards ET NOW on December 27,2014 at 7:30 p.m. and repeat telecast on December 28,2014 at 4:30 p.m.

ENCOURAGING HEALTHCARE INITIATIVES

L to R: Ranjana Smetacek, Director General, Organisation of Pharmaceutical Producersof India (OPPI); Vishal Bali, Asia Head, Healthcare, TPG Growth; Dr. C.A.K. Yesudian,Dean, School of Health Systems Studies, Tata Institute of Social Sciences

L to R: Meeta Rajivlochan, Commissioner, Municipal Administration, Government ofMaharashtra; Dr. Kiran Marthak, Member of Board of Directors and Global Head - Clinical Development, Lambda Research; Sharad Tyagi, Managing Director,Boehringer Ingelheim India

There are some who become the leading lights in their field,setting standards and becoming the ‘Thought Leaders’

SELECTION PROCESS

All the winners of the 1st Healthcare Achievers Awards across all the categories alongside Ram Vilas Paswan, Lov Verma and Bipasha Basu

I would like tocongratulate The Times

of India Group and NewIndia Assurance for takingthis initiative. All of us need

recognition and this is avery good first step.

Lov VermaSecretary, Ministry of Health & Family Welfare

G. SRINIVASANChairman cumManaging Directorof New IndiaAssurance

As the largest healthinsurance player in thismarket we have realisedthat if healthcare in thiscountry has to improveand people have to getquality healthcaretreatment then there isa need for all thestakeholder to cometogether. So the idea forthis initiative is to bringall the stakeholderstogether.

JURY SPEAKIt has been a tough process because there is so much goodwork that the Indian healthcare delivery sector is doing, partic-ularly all the big names of the healthcare and the many inno-

vators that are now beginning to disrupt healthcare in thiscountry. So I think that this is a fantastic platform for all the

trendsetters and innovators to come together and it is definite-ly a very, very tough task to bring out the best among the best.

Vishal Bali,Asia Head-Healthcare, TPG Growth

A CONSUMER CONNECT INITIATIVE

THE TIMES OF INDIA, AHMEDABADTUESDAY, DECEMBER 23, 201412