The company, which is engaged in setting up ICU facilities by partnering with healthcare service providers, currently manages over 300 ICU beds across Tamil Nadu, as per its founder Dr Raja Amarnath.

He said the company by partnering with other healthcare service providers offer ICU services to patients particularly in ‘’rural areas’’ where such facilities were not available immediately.

“Normally, people in rural areas travel long distances to a top hospital...Only such hospitals will have ICUs. We partner with local hospitals, set up the ICUs as standalone entities. We are adding years to life...not a year to the people who need care. We are seeing it on a daily basis across CIPACA,” he said.

CIPACA also received an award from the Central government as “India’s Best Rural ICU service provider in New Delhi,’’ he said.

Asked whether there were similar players offering the service, he said there was no such organisation available in India – it may be like some hospitals may supply equipment, some others may send some doctors to rural areas instead of setting up ICUs like ours.

To a query, Amarnath, a pulmonologist for over two decades, said the company makes investments of about Rs 1 cr for setting up an ICU unit in a hospital which is located in a rural area.

On the expansion plans, he said, “next two years we are concentrating in south. We want to manage 1,000 ICU beds in this region.”