Case: ACCESS Health India and the Ayushman Bharat Digital Mission (2022 | Case No. SM359 | Length 24 pages)
Authors: Kevin Schulman and Aditya Narayan, Stanford University
Background:
While India had made significant progress against diseases like polio and tetanus, the pandemic revealed marked differences in COVID-related illness and death among the country’s most vulnerable. Urban-rural and other societal divides added to long-time disparities in access to health care, and public resources could be overwhelmed.
Could a new national health plan and digital health mission allow India to innovate on health care, with the goal of creating high-quality affordable health care for all? This case explores a multi-stakeholder, collaborative approach to understanding and leveraging new technologies that could integrate a complex, fragmented health care system. This ambitious effort would involve harnessing mobile technologies and expanding broadband access to provide critical digital health solutions for India’s large rural population. And this effort would capitalize on best practices and lessons elsewhere in the digital health ecosystem—allowing India to leapfrog the shortcomings of national health information systems that had emerged elsewhere in the world.
Learning Objective:
This case is designed to help students understand the complex architecture and strategies involved in implementing digital health services to transform healthcare at the national level. Students will explore the progress and challenges in developing a comprehensive healthcare system in India, based on the latest advances in digital technology.
For inquires about obtaining the case, contact Stanford’s Case Writing Office.