It may soon be possible for patients to understand the drug they have been

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prescribed and the possible contraindications associated with it, by way of an SMS on their mobile handsets.

Health Net global, part of the Apollo group, which is into providing healthcare solutions by integrating IT and telecom solutions, is set to come up with Hipaar (Healthcare India Pharmaceutical Registry), a drug database.

An individual, be it a doctor or a patient can send a text message from his phone with basic details regarding the patient’s name, diagnosis and the name of the drug. The platform in turn responds by providing details of the prescribed medicine and the drug-to-drug interactions and contradictions.

Hipaar could provide details regarding drug-food and drug-test interactions too. The database so far has 3,000 most commonly used drugs. Apollo Hospitals group executive director Sangita Reddy said the product in its initial form was used by Wipro and was piloted in Bhubaneshwar, Hyderabad and Chennai to be launched commercially in six months.

“The ultimate idea of such a platform is to make people aware of their personal health and side effects in a time-effective manner. It is for the first time in South Asia that such an initiative is being taken,” she told reporters in Hyderabad on Wednesday.

The platform is developed in association with five societies including International Association of Medical Informatics, International Society for Information and Telehealth, Computer Society of India, Telemedicine Society of India and International Society for Telehealth.

“Eventually, the data base number may go up by 15 to 20 per cent. However, what is more important is that it provides knowledge about drug interactions that are used in day to day life,” she said without divulging further details.

Meanwhile, Apollo will host a two-day conference on patient safety & healthcare IT at Hyderabad from Thursday. “Healthcare IT has become a critical driver of change and represents an opportunity not only to reduce cost but enhance access and scale,” said Dr K Ganapathy, president of Apollo Telemedicine Networking Foundation.

The conference would seek new avenues of fusing healthcare and technology, for common man, he said.