Research Reports
DocsApp (now Medibuddy) Impact Thesis
August 19, 2020
In this White Paper, we present our impact thesis for a proposed investment in DocsApp, a Bangalore-based company with a mission to provide end-to-end telemedicine care to low-resource, underserved populations in India and other low- and middle-income countries (“LMICs”). This is a different type of impact thesis than our usual White Papers, insofar as we do not focus on any one disease burden, but, rather, on the broad infrastructural needs of clinician, specialist, pharmacy, and lab testing access for target populations, particularly in India, the first country of market launch.
India and Africa are classified as countries that score very low on penetration of healthcare services, particularly with respect to secondary and tertiary cities, and rural populations, where access challenges to clinicians and especially specialists are greatest. Compounding these access concerns are: (1) rising burdens of non- communicable diseases (“NCDs”) alongside the unfolding horrific consequences of COVID-19; (2) quality of care issues with some doctors; (3) affordable and time/distance challenges; and (4) weak, decentralized support from hospitals, testing labs, and pharmacies.
Goals 3, 8, and 17, of the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals speak to the importance of recruitment, retention, allocation, mobilization, and efficiency (e.g., through cost-cutting and expanded reach) of healthcare workers in LMICs.FN1
With the advent of telemedicine, significantly larger groups of patients can receive advice/guidance from healthcare experts (some for the first time), without the need of travel, loss of wages, and related household burdens. These trends have been brought about by many factors, including: (a) the explosive growth in mobile smartphone and internet users in India (now at ~560MM and 1.17B, respectively);FN2 (b) India’s increased awareness that health experts will not in the foreseeable future (and perhaps ever) match the growing burdens of chronic illness and other priority diseases afflicting low-resource geographies; (c) more recently, social distancing imperatives brought about by COVID-19 exigencies; and (d) growing government and health care society support for removing barriers that historically blunted telemedicine growth.
In this White Paper, we discuss:
in Section II, the multitude of challenges to seeking access to clinicians in India; in Section III, clinician access challenges in Africa, a future target for DocsApp;
in Section IV, telemedicine as a potential solution to clinician, testing, and medication access challenges, particularly in view of recent telemedicine developments in both India and Africa that are making these solutions more possible;
in Section V, the specifics of DocsApp’s telemedicine platform, and how it provides important solutions to the many challenges described in this report – the unmet needs with respect to clinician, specialist, testing and medication access; and finally
in Section VI, as we do with all of our impact theses for proposed investments, a broad template for providing Annual Reports on DocsApp to update our stakeholders on progress with respect to multiple impact metrics, milestones, and achievements that we expect to continue to see from this exciting and growing Company.
Please email c.haynes@teamfundhealth.org to request access to the full report.
FN1 Transforming our world: the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. United Nations, Department of Economic and Social Affairs Sustainable Development. https://sdgs.un.org/2030agenda.
FN2 Kaka, Noshir, et al. Digital India: Technology to Transform a Connected Nation. McKinsey Global Institute. March 27, 2019. https://www.mckinsey.com/business-functions/mckinsey- digital/our-insights/digital-india-technology-to-transform-a-connected-nation#.