By Hamed Mahmoud
Mahmoud Abdel Hakim, co-founder and CEO of Doctor Online for virtual medical consultations, said that the platform received new funding in the second quarter (Q2) of 2021.
Abdel Hakim said the platform introduces a new idea for online medical services, which will commence with providing an easy platform that matches the needs of patients.
This will also give the doctor the ability to communicate with patients from anywhere, providing them with an initial diagnosis, or referring them to centres specialised in medical tests and x-ray services.
According to Abdul Hakim, Doctor Online provides many services, including: setting an appointment with the doctor; conducting an examination via video calls; informing the doctor of test results; and referring the patient either to the radiology and analysis centres, or to visit the doctor’s office later.
He explained that the platform also allows patients to book another consultation, without the need for additional expenses.
Abdel Hakim said that the examination expenses are up to 50% cheaper than those paid by the patient at the clinics in their traditional form. He added that Doctor Online contributes to conserving the time of both the patient and the doctor.
The platform allows a detailed report on the patient’s record that the doctor can complete immediately after the examination is completed. This helps achieve a kind of correlation of the disease history of each patient on the platform.
It also allows reliance on artificial intelligence techniques to determine the type of clinic that the patient needs in case he does not know.
He said that the Doctor Online platform began its work in the Egyptian market in 2019. The beginning of the novel coronavirus (Covid-19) pandemic contributed to the rapid growth of the platform.
During 2020 alone, it recorded more than 4,000 appointments for 100 doctors on the platform. The number of subscribers so far has reached 14,000.
Abdel Hakim expects that Doctor Online will achieve more than 50,000 appointments this year, and 500,000 in 2022.
He stressed that the doctors on the platform are very carefully selected, as they mostly represent doctors from a range of Egyptian universities, including: Cairo University; Ain Shams University; and Alexandria University, among others.
This is in addition to a number of Egyptian doctors in the UK, who provide medical consultations to patients from Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Sudan.
Abdel Hakim presented the investment plans to Doctor Online, as a company incubated by the Falak Startups, a business accelerator affiliated with the Egypt Entrepreneurship and Innovation Company affiliated to the Ministry of International Co-operation.
He announced that the platform is awaiting the entry of a new round of investments as the partner will acquire part of the equity within the current month.
Regarding the expansion plans for Doctor Online, Abdel Hakim mentioned that the company plans to add new services, such as requesting x-rays and tests immediately after the examination.
