Health Care at Home India and QMS Medical Allied Services announce patient support partnership
The two firms will merge their patient support businesses into QMS subsidiary Sarathi Healthcare to serve pharmaceutical companies at a larger scale.
Home healthcare company Health Care at Home India Pvt. Ltd. (HCAH) and QMS Medical Allied Services Ltd. (QMS) have announced a strategic partnership. QMS is an integrated healthcare company listed on the main board of the National Stock Exchange. The partnership aims to take patient support services for pharmaceutical companies to a larger scale.
Under the partnership, the patient support businesses of both companies will be merged into Sarathi Healthcare, a wholly owned subsidiary of QMS. Through the combined platform, more than 12 lakh patients will be served under over 160 patient support programmes. A network of more than 2,000 healthcare professionals across over 35 cities will continue to operate.
The services will cover multiple stages, including patient screening, registration, treatment initiation, treatment continuity, financial and medical assistance for patients, and disease management. The aim of the merger is to build India's largest patient support services platform. Leading Indian and multinational pharmaceutical companies in the country will be served through this platform. The effort will be to build a larger service system while maintaining continuity of existing customers, service programmes and employees.
Mahesh Makhija, founder, chairman and managing director of QMS Medical Allied Services Ltd., said, "This partnership brings together two complementary service systems in patient support and continuous patient engagement. Our aim is to combine these capabilities to give pharmaceutical companies broader services and larger reach. The partnership will also be used to ensure that more patients get the help they need across the entire course of treatment. It will also help create value for QMS shareholders."
Aditya Burman, director of HCAH and director of Dabur India Ltd., said, "Especially in the treatment of long-term illnesses, merely starting treatment is not enough; continuous engagement with and guidance for patients is necessary afterwards as well. With the capabilities of HCAH and QMS combined, patients and partners in the pharmaceutical sector will get wide reach, technology and effective execution to support them through the full duration of treatment."
The partnership will bring together experience and capability in health and awareness camps, screening for various diseases, patient registration, disease management, treatment initiation, treatment continuity, patient support and continuous patient engagement. This will allow pharmaceutical companies to be given broader support across the entire journey, from identifying a patient to continuing treatment.
According to the companies' estimates, the global patient support services market is about 70 billion US dollars. In India, the market is growing at 15 to 20 per cent a year and is projected to reach about 1 billion US dollars by 2030. Growing regulation of advertising and promotion in the pharmaceutical sector, increasing formalisation of the sector, rising cases of chronic illness, greater use of digital technology and a growing emphasis on continuous monitoring of patients' treatment are supporting the sector's growth.
QMS Medical Allied Services Ltd. is an integrated healthcare company working in healthcare products and services. The company is active in patient engagement and communication, patient care programmes, disease management, preventive health programmes, patient screening and medical camps, healthcare manpower, and medical and diagnostic services. Through its integrated model, QMS serves pharmaceutical companies, healthcare providers and patients. The company focuses on helping patients get the treatment they need, maintaining continuity of treatment and making health outcomes more effective.
