Fortis Healthcare has announced that Dr Bishnu Panigrahi has re-joined the company as Group Head, Medical Strategy and Operations in order to make a more substantial contribution to the patient care and clinical excellence parameters. In his earlier stint, Dr Panigrahi spearheaded medical operations at Fortis Healthcare from January 2012 to August, 2018.

Dr Panigrahi is a seasoned healthcare professional who has a distinctive experience of 39 years out of which 12 years was as an educator and 27 years was in the corporate world where he worked with Indraprastha Apollo, Fortis and Max Healthcare. Before rejoining Fortis, he was associated with Kalinga Institute of Medical Sciences (KIMS), Bhubaneswar as Chief Executive Officer.

In his last stint with Fortis, Dr Panigrahi contributed significantly to the strategic growth of the company through the channel of Medical Strategy, Quality, Training & Education. His visionary outlook in establishing Fortis’s Clinical Leadership in the areas of clinical outcomes, patient safety, infection control and research is well respected across the industry. He put Fortis on the international forefront of clinical outcomes by becoming a member of the ICHOM Steering Committee for the Coronary Artery Disease. He put together Medical Process Assurance system for rigorous audit of the key medical processes.

As part of the working group at International Consortium for Health Outcomes Measurement (ICHOM), Dr Panigrahi and the team were responsible for conceptualising the standard sets for Coronary Artery Disease outcome measurement. These standard sets were rolled out in November 2013 at Harvard Business School, Boston by Prof Michael E Porter. Dr Panigrahi has also fostered the Anti-Microbial Stewardship programme since its inception and helped institutionalise a comprehensive Medical Audit system.

Dr Panigrahi aspired to become a Foreign Service officer. However, a series of events and life-changing experiences inspired him to take up medicine as a profession. After graduating from SCB Medical College, Cuttack, Dr Panigrahi pursued post-graduation in Anaesthesia from the reputed Delhi University. Subsequently, he went on to receive further training in Cardiac and Neuro Anaesthesia from Sri Chitra Tirunal Institute for Medical Sciences and Technology.