Today, there are millions of people in each country who have the risk of developing permanent Visual Impairment due to Diabetes, Hypertension and other Chronic Health Problems. With almost 60 million people in India being affected by diabetes, of which one in every four people have diabetic retinopathy an illness which damages the retina due to complications caused by diabetes, less than 5 percent of these patients gets screened by Ophthalmologists. India is a country where there are only nine ophthalmologists for every million people, as compared to the U.S., which has 81 ophthalmologists for every million people. This alarmed Dr. Senthil and Dr. Malathi, who with a vision to bridge this gap established Welcare Health Systems(WHS), an affordable eye screening startup offering services by certified ophthalmologists that work remotely with existing health centers, making their service accessible to patients who are at risk to blindness.

Headquartered in Chennai, Welcare works in association with partner centers through a financially viable business model where it converts existing Healthcare centers to Teleophthalmology centers and helps them provide valuable sight saving service to its patients.

Currently reaching out to more than 3 lakh patients annually across 275 Indian locations and one location in Africa, Welcare prevents many of them from developing sight threatening eye problems. The organization provides Teleophthalmology services which connect a patient in a remote location to an Ophthalmologist in another location. These services can be availed by Diabetic patients, Hypertensive patients, patients with Visual Complaints, anyone coming for a regular Eye Checkup, patients over the age of 40, patients with Cataracts, patients with Retinal Problems and many more. Any patient who walks in for an eye checkup would be advised to have a Teleophthalmology consultation which helps in identifying major diseases like Diabetic Retinopathy, Hypertensive Retinopathy, Glaucoma, AgeRelated Macular, and Cataracts.

The organization provides Teleophthalmology services which connect a patient in a remote location to an Ophthalmologist in another location

India’s largest Teleophthalmology company, Welcare has developed its own customized software platform for Teleophthalmology wherein reports from Partner Centers are uploaded in a secure cloudbased platform, and the Ophthalmologists login and see the images and provide reports in minutes to Partner Centers. “At Welcare, we leverage new technology for the screenings and keep the costing low by having

certified ophthalmologists working remotely. Welcare has identified solutions which are innovative and can reach out to the population on a large scale and prevent blindness by the usage of technology. Also, our role is only in screening, hence, we don’t interfere in the independence of the patient or the physician for selecting an Ophthalmologist of choice for their treatment,” says Dr. Tamilarasan Senthil, Founder & CEO, Welcare Health Systems.

Welcare has received a smart CEO Startup 50 awards 2016 and CII healthcare entrepreneurship Award in Healthcare 2017. The organization is also working together with Government in bringing Universal Screening for Diabetic Retinopathy using Telemedicine Technology and the Rapid Advances in Artificial Intelligence Technology and Advanced Imaging solutions that would help reach out to a large number of patients. Technological implementations like USFDA and CE certified, Encrypted cloud based servers, and Advanced Telemedicine software is used to ensure that services are in sync with the advancing telemedicine industry.

Dr.T.Senthil recommends Welcare for all Diabetologists who want to start Retinopathy screening Services in their centers as Welcare hold significant partnerships with major medical bodies or other tieups including India’s Leading corporate Hospital chain, India’s leading Diabetes chai, State Governments. Signing off,he says, “We are working towards doubling our number of centers in this financial year through various Indian and International partnerships also working towards creating our own Artificial Intelligence for Basic Level Screening of Diabetic Retinopathy.”