June 23, 2025
The Health-QUEST (Quality Upgradation Enabled through Space Technology) initiative, jointly undertaken by the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), the Association of Healthcare Providers India (AHPI), and the Society for Emergency Medicine India (SEMI), has successfully concluded its implementation phase. Launched in 2017, the programme aimed at enhancing the quality, safety, and efficiency of emergency care in Indian hospitals by adapting systems and practices from the space sector.
Over the years, progress under the initiative was shared with the public at various stages. The latest milestone is the publication of detailed findings in the International Journal for Quality in Health Care (ISQUA). This publication presents the outcomes of the programme’s pilot phase, which was implemented across 10 hospitals, covering more than 10,000 patients. The pilot introduced real-time tracking of key performance indicators such as door-to-triage, door-to-doctor, pain assessment, and discharge times. The results demonstrated measurable improvements in patient flow and clinical responsiveness. For example, triage times were consistently brought under five minutes, pain assessments were conducted 23 minutes earlier on average, and discharge times were reduced by up to 90 minutes. These improvements reflect the effective integration of space mission principles such as process accuracy, monitoring, and standardisation into healthcare operations.
With the pilot phase concluded and its effectiveness validated, the Health-QUEST team is now preparing for the next stage of the initiative. Future activities include geospatial mapping of emergency care facilities, AI-driven forecasting for emergency department crowding, and wider adoption of standardised protocols across hospitals.
ISRO’s involvement in Health-QUEST highlights its commitment to applying space-derived knowledge for public benefit. Through this initiative, ISRO has demonstrated how space technologies and process engineering approaches can contribute meaningfully to addressing challenges in critical areas like healthcare, thus reinforcing its role in supporting national development through science and technology.