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Abstract India's healthcare system faces a critical shortage of radiologists, with only 1.3 to 1.5 per million people, significantly lower than the ratios in developed countries. This shortage is exacerbated by India's vast population of approximately 1.42 billion, with an estimated 1.5 million radiological scans conducted daily, primarily in urban centers. Consequently, this concentration of services leads to considerable diagnostic delays in rural and underserved areas. This paper proposes implementing an interconnected remote teleradiology platform as a strategic solution to distribute the workload of radiologists more equitably across states, thereby enhancing the timeliness and accuracy of diagnostics. Teleradiology, which enables the remote reading of radiological images by specialists, could significantly improve the efficiency of diagnostic processes and facilitate quicker clinical decision-making. This study presents a scalable model for a state-level inter-connected remote teleradiology platform, outlining its potential to improve health outcomes by overcoming geographical, physical, and infrastructural barriers. The paper also discusses the necessary technological, regulatory, and educational frameworks to support such an initiative and addresses challenges such as data security and the need for robust infrastructure. Additionally, the paper includes a high-level diagrammatic model of the proposed interconnected remote teleradiology platform at the state level, emphasizing its potential advantages.
Raheja et al. (Mon,) studied this question.