Pakistan

Pakistan Telemedicine Pilot Project

Keeping in view natural disasters which severely damage landline communications, therefore, affected areas become isolated to provide medical facilities, in these situations; satellite communication by using VSAT technology is the reliable means of direct connection to the disaster areas where communication is critical for tele-medical consultations and patient treatment.

SUPARCO, being a national space agency of Pakistan and having an experience in satellite communications has initiated a Satellite Communication based Telemedicine network as pilot project which has been successfully established. VSAT (Very Small Aperture Terminal), state of art technology has been selected to provide broad band (satellite) connectivity, for live video conferencing, transfer of high quality biomedical images i.e. CT scan, MRI, X-rays etc, that best meets the requirements of doctors/specialists. Two sites have been connected through Paksat-1 satellite transponder, one at Jinnah Post Graduate Medical Center (JPMC), Karachi as hub and other at Shikarpur civil hospital (interior Sindh) as remote site.

Furthermore, SUPARCO has joint venture with JPMC for better utilization of satellite based network infrastructure regarding telemedicine applications, including tele-consultations and tele-trainings etc.