3 govt hospitals join Digital India initiative, open Twitter accounts

NEW DELHI: Three central government-run hospitals in Delhi — Safdarjung, Lady Hardinge and Dr Ram Manohar Lohia — started Twitter accounts last week to take forward

NEW DELHI: Three central government-run hospitals in Delhi — Safdarjung, Lady Hardinge and Dr Ram Manohar Lohia — started Twitter accounts last week to take forward the Centre’s Digital India initiative.

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All three joined twitter on June 21 — the International Day of Yoga — to update people about new initiatives as well as upcoming programmes and workshops.

“The dharamshala, which will provide lodging space to the families of patients, will be inaugurated soon. We would be starting a few new courses. The Twitter account will help us in disseminating information about these things directly to the public,” said Dr AK Gadhpayle, the medical superintendent of Dr Ram Manohar Lohia hospital.

Over the past few weeks, the hospital has posted 11 tweets using its @RMLDelhi account and got 10 likes and 34 followers. The tweets were about Yoga Day celebration at the hospital, newspaper clippings and the inauguration of the AMRIT — the affordable medicine and implants store.

“We might update unusual cases or interesting cases which come to the hospital for the knowledge of the public at large,” said Dr AK Rai, medical superintendent of Safdarjung hospital. The hospital will also take note of any complaints from patients that they receive on their twitter feed.

The twitter handle for the hospital is @SJHDelhi which has 15 tweets, 17 followers and 7 likes. The tweets were about the history of the hospital and newspaper clippings where doctors of the hospital have been quoted.

The Twitter handle for Lady Hardinge Medical College is @ LHMCDelhi, which has 7 tweets and 16 followers. The hospital has also set-up a Facebook account which says, “This is the official FB page for Lady Hardinge Medical College and Hospitals, created by MoHFW as part of social media outreach of the health ministry.”

The All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS), which is an autonomous institute under the ministry of health and family welfare, had also set-up a twitter account in January 2015. To date, it has 39 tweets only.