Research and advisory firm Imarc expects India’s healthcare sector to create a total demand of 34 million smart cards during 2013-2018. According to the report, the application of smart card technology can protect patient records and significantly reduce paper work. Researchers say smart cards can hold encrypted patient information and use a digital signature or a biometric template to reduce ambiguity about the cardholder’s identification. The usage of smart cards can also reduce the occurrence of fraud in health benefit claims – a significant issue for both private and public health insurance firms. Findings from the report suggest that the bulk of the demand in the healthcare sector currently comes from the Rashtriya Swasthaya Bima Yojna (RSBY), a Central Government’s health insurance scheme for the unorganized sector workers belonging to the BPL (below poverty line) category and their families. Apart from the RSBY, the report also expects a number of other healthcare providers to introduce smart cards in the coming years. Government healthcare providers such as Ex-Servicemen Contributory Health Scheme (ECHS), Central Government Health Scheme (CGHS), etc are already providing smart cards to their members. Although most government and private health insurance providers are currently providing non-smart card based health cards to their members, analysts expect most of them to adopt smart card technology in the short and medium terms.
