Raffles Medical Group to join Mayo Clinic Care Network

SINGAPORE'S integrated private-healthcare provider Raffles Medical Group (RMG) announced on Wednesday it would join the US-based Mayo Clinic Care Network.

RMG will be the first in Asia to join the network, and the services provided will be available only at its Singapore general practitioner clinics, specialist outpatient clinics and hospital, Dr Donald Poon, general manager of Raffles Hospital, said.

RMG also operates and manages affiliate clinics and laboratories in Hong Kong and Shanghai.

The Care Network, a collaboration between the non-profit Mayo Clinic and autonomous healthcare providers, has 32 members in 18 US states, Mexico and Puerto Rico. It allows members to remotely access resources from the medical practice and research group, headquartered in Rochester, Minnesota.

"As a member of the Care Network, Raffles will have access to tools that . . . we use within our own system," Dr David Hayes, medical director for the network, said.

Such tools include electronic consultations with Mayo specialists, access to an online information system of Mayo-vetted clinical reference materials and the sharing of expertise in quality management within the member organisation.

Both Dr Poon and Dr Hayes agreed that while Mayo Clinic's status as a non-profit organisation and RMG's as a public-listed entity were not analogous, the collaboration would not affect their respective operations.

"The more we got to know Raffles the more we realised that, yes, we're different in terms of our financial approach to things . . . but otherwise (we're) similar in every other way, so I don't think that will change the way either of us operate," Dr Hayes said.

Dr Poon added that for patients, this partnership would not result in "any significant extra cost".