Resident doctors at All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) and students from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Delhi have developed a mobile application that would bring COVID-19 patients and the donor of plasma on the same platform reported a news agency on Wednesday.
The app COPAL 19 was launched on Wednesday to honour the National Doctors Day.
Dr. Abhinav Singh, a neurosurgeon at AIIMS and the brain behind the app, said that the app would work as a bridge between the patients in need of plasma and donors. The only requirement for the donor is to complete the 28 days post-recovery from COVID-19 infection to become eligible for a plasma donation.
"It is a very simple app. It has two options where users can register themselves as a donor or a patient. It keeps an automated record of the donors. The patient would have to place a request on the app for plasma, and he/she would be put in touch with the donor of the same blood group by the blood bank of the hospital," said Dr. Singh.
The app, currently in the testing phase, is being used only in AIIMS right now. "We are currently keeping a record of the patients receiving treatment at AIIMS and contacting the patients who have recovered from the hospital and are willing to become donors," Dr Abhinav said.
He also said that he had kept the app an open-source product. "Any institution can copy the code and modify the application as per their requirement. However, they can use the current app as well," he informed.
The app will also automatically track donors who will be eligible to donate plasma after a cycle of every 14 days.
While Dr. Abhinav is the brain behind the app, his brother Tushar Singh, pursuing engineering at IIT, is the hand behind the app.
The app contains the personal details of the patients. Recently, India banned dozens of apps which were harnessing personal information of users for their gains. When asked how the app would ensure the safety of the users' data, Singh said, "We only want names, blood group, contact number, and city of residence to build a profile. The app would demand no sensitive information of a user".
The app will be available on Google Play store once its testing is completed.
