Flash Health is a digital healthcare company that provides multiple healthcare services islandwide. The core services provided by Flash Health include medicine delivery, medical equipment, and home diagnostic services.
Flash Health Co-Founder M. Arshad Ameer initiated the digital service following his experience in Bangladesh, having introduced the largest digital healthcare service in the country, moving up from zero to 6 million users. Speaking to Brunch, he said that he was inspired by the potential that Bangladesh showed, where in a country with just a 24% literacy rate, they were able to digitise the healthcare service industry. Ameer shared that he was certain Sri Lanka, with its incredible 90% literacy rate, would be absolutely receptive to the service Flash Health has to offer.
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With a strong placement in our digital real estate, the technology-led approach to delivering care support helps us deliver an un-intrusive experience to our customers. This helps them lead a better and healthy lifestyle, or, at least, helps them get on a pathway to battle the condition they are in Flash Health Co-Founder M. Arshad Ameer [/caption]
Ameer shared that much like what they experienced in Bangladesh, in Sri Lanka there exists a gap in digital services for healthcare. While we do have telemedicine, and other services including pharmaceutical delivery, there is no umbrella group that is able to provide all-inclusive services under one roof. He said: “We are a passionate team looking to combine cutting-edge technology with healthcare, with the aim of revolutionising digital healthcare in Sri Lanka by providing consumers with exceptional convenience and access to health services.”
He pointed out that in terms of implementation, whereas in Bangladesh there was a necessity of seven touchpoints to reach the user, in Sri Lanka, it has been far simpler. With just two iterations, they have been able to successfully communicate the service to its users. Despite Lankans often being hesitant to accept new things, particularly new technology, and Flash Health’s technology being paired with medicine, it could prove to be an uphill battle, though Ameer said that there is incredible potential in the market.
Healthcare services are perceived as a difficult and at times, an expensive activity. However, Flash Health was built with the focus of making it as simple as realistically possible.
Ameer explained that Flash Health empowers their caregivers to reach them directly to deliver immediate and responsive care, providing that they have a medicine delivery service where they deliver this as a service to B2C (business-to-consumer) and B2B2C (business-to-business-to-consumer) segments. Having two partners on retainer, and in collaboration with several pharmacies, Ameer said that they are able to provide a competitive service, guaranteeing delivery within two hours of placing an order as opposed to the current market average of 24-48 hours. They also work closely with Sri Lanka’s existing digital medical services like oDoc and MyDoctor.lk.
Their other service vertical is the Home Diagnostics vertical where the platform works in partnership with Forte Diagnostics, where they cover all tests from PCR to generic NCD chronic tests, simple blood sugar tests, and ECGs. There is a total of a relative 6,000-plus variant tests which can be done as at-home tests courtesy of Home Diagnostics.
Home Diagnostics eliminates the requirement of running to hospitals and waiting in lines to get a test done which causes a great amount of stress and cumulative risk considering the current pandemic times, and the opportunity to get tests done at your home offers great relief to many.
With regards to the PCR tests, however, Ameer did point out that as government health regulations have mandated that at-home portable tests are ill-advised, they are currently not carrying out that specific service. He also added that they are currently in conversation with the relevant authorities with regards to assisting in the distribution of the vaccine. However, at present, it remains entirely government-regulated.
Ameer shared that Flash Health has its own digital real estate, the mobile app, for customers to place orders on medication and lab tests, stating that the app provides a service not dissimilar to what one is used to via the Uber transport app experience, but highly specialised for the healthcare front. For example, users are given the opportunity to have their medication or lab requests tracked from the point of submission, all the way till the medication or lab report is delivered and/or is ready for viewing.
In doing so, Flash Health provides an experience as opposed to a simple service via their app. Ameer added that healthcare, be it digital or not, is never a one-size-fits-all solution, and therefore, the Flash Health app has been developed with great care and attention to detail with the application based on extensive user experience, utilising an open concept design; simple and self-explanatory.
“With a strong placement in our digital real estate, the technology-led approach to delivering care support helps us deliver an un-intrusive experience to our customers. This helps them lead a better and healthy lifestyle, or, at least, helps them get on a pathway to battle the condition they are in,” said Ameer.
Flash Health’s services have expanded greatly since its inception with the introduction of islandwide delivery and service, in line with their ethos of “Medicare anywhere anytime”. Having reached users in Badulla, Hatton, and numerous other corners of the island, Ameer said that they only wish to further streamline their services to make it even more efficient moving forward. He added that coming soon would also be a rewards system where customers can stand a chance to earn money while they use the application. “After all, everyone deserves high-quality products and services for lower prices,” he said.
Speaking to Ameer about the decision to provide healthcare services despite coming from a tech background, he shared that it was a personal experience that fuelled his interest. Having seen what was going on in Bangladesh, the hardships faced by many in order to gain access to healthcare, and his own experience in purchasing medicine for his parents, needing to fly in and out of the country to do so, he said that there was the clear thought of “could this not be better, more streamlined?”. He shared that things in the medical field often look complicated because of the different lens in which it is viewed and even its attempts to reach the public in the digital sphere that we see today can look complicated because of this. There are fantastic products being offered in not-so-user-friendly, and therefore, inaccessible ways. Considering his tech background, Ameer said that they were able to come up with a viable solution to the problem by looking at it from an entirely different perspective. He shared that Flash Health’s mission is to challenge the current spectrum of services on healthcare and re-invent them by making it customer-centric from the get-go.
For the one year and two months the app has been operational, Ameer shared that the response has been overwhelmingly positive. He did point out, however, that while they have set past their initial projections, their timing could not have been more perfect. While globally, it is a difficult time, Flash Health was launched just at the cusp of the pandemic and was able to make itself available at a time where it was most needed. And so, he shared, he is very much aware that where they are right now is somewhat of a “bubble” and that only time will tell the true reception to Flash Health, but as of now, they are incredibly pleased with the reaction and are impressed by how quickly the public has adapted to the introduction of the concept of digital healthcare.
Flash Health prides itself in its values – speed, quality, and simplicity; having embedded them deeply into the roots of their processes and systems to provide the best customer experience possible, Ameer said that their goal is to deliver a one-stop health shop that provides everything possible for any type of condition, from fever to cancerous diseases.
