How often have families rushed their dear ones to nearest hospitals during emergencies with little consideration about the quality and cost of services, only to be left devastated both emotionally and economically?

ShopDoc, a healthcare solution app for patient referral services developed by a start-up and incubated by the Kerala Startup Mission at its Technology Innovation Zone at Kinfra Hi-tech Park, Kalamassery, aims at addressing this specific issue. Rather than limiting to a virtual outpatient consultation, the app guides the patients in their journey from primary care to multi-specialty hospital treatment and medical procedure in a cost-effective and time-bound manner by negotiating with the hospitals.

ShopDoc was founded by an experienced expatriate entrepreneur in the healthcare domain, Shihab Makaniyil, along with Razik Ashraf and Zahid Makaniyil. Launched in November last year, the app is now operational in Kerala and Karnataka with a pan-India roll-out planned shortly.

“Often, the patients are in the dark about the care needed and charges involved at various hospitals and we target to address that gray area and empower them. Based on the user requirement, we browse through and refer the most efficient and cost-effective service. An unsatisfied user can approach us and we will intervene on their behalf,” said Mr. Makaniyil, founder & CEO of ShopDoc.

The service is now 50% automated while manual intervention with patients account for the rest during the interim period of full scale technology adaptation. The start-up has so far facilitated over 18,000 patient referrals while the app, available in Play Store and App Store, has registered over 12,000 downloads. The start-up has also tied up with 175 hospitals across Kerala and Karnataka and is still counting while 2545 specialist doctors have subscribed to it.

“A study has found that the people of Kerala spend nearly 60,000 crore a year in medical expenses. Our three-tier smart referral system will help patients to connect the right healthcare providers ensuring transparency and accountability in the private healthcare sector" said Co-founder & COO Razik Ashraf.

An independent medical board of qualified healthcare experts is also on the anvil to determine the treatment specifications required and post-treatment analysis.

“We are also planning to launch by November a service, whereby children settled abroad will be able to monitor the treatment of their elderly parents back at home remotely through the app,” said Mr. Makaniyil.