AHPI inks MoU with AiMeD to promote Indian Medical Devices Industry

Hyderabad: Association of Healthcare Providers of India (AHPI) and Association of Indian Medical Device Industry (AiMeD) on Saturday signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to support Make in India of medical devices to transform India into a global medical devices manufacturing hub and simultaneously promote the India Certification of Medical Devices Scheme (ICMED), country’s first indigenously developed international class quality assurance system for India manufactured medical devices.

The MoU was signed by AiMeD Forum Coordinator Rajiv Nath and AHPI Director-General Dr Girdhar Gyani at the function held in Delhi.

As per the MoU, AHPI and AiMeD will work together to jointly promote Indian Medical Devices Industry and specially promote ICMED (from Quality Council of India) certified products in over 10000 member Indian hospitals aimed at enhancing patient safety, increasing consumer protection along with providing much needed product credentials to manufacturers to instill confidence among the buyers, AiMED said in a release here.

The scheme is also intended to significantly eliminate trading of sub-standard products or devices where supply chains are unknown, a widespread and injurious occurrence in the Indian market.

Both AHPI and AiMED recognize specifically the need for setting up of an independent, multi-stakeholder governing structure for the Scheme(s).

AHPI shall operate the Scheme(s) by setting up an independent multi-stakeholder steering committee(s) and any other committees necessary for the purpose in consultation with AiMED.

AiMeD would provide the technical documents developed by QCI for ICMED quality management system certification and ICMED Plus product certification to AHPI for enabling 1 Step Beyond Endorsement and shall provide all technical support to AHPI in managing and promoting the Scheme(s).

Speaking on the occasion, Rajiv Nath said this MoU will give a big push to manufacturing and innovation in the Indian medical device industry while promoting the Indian healthcare sector as a whole. This initiative will also help to reduce the country's huge import dependency in the medical device sector while encouraging exports.

Dr Girdhar Gyani said that member hospitals are committed in providing cost-effective quality health care to the community and strongly feel the need for access to indigenous high-quality dependable products especially considering the need to be competitive in healthcare delivery more so in the context of recently launched Ayushman Bharat project.

We need sooner than later our own products and certification schemes, which can be progressively brought at par with the global benchmarks, he said.

Under the joint mechanism, both associations will soon roll out activities to achieve the objectives of this MoU.